Arthur Goes Fifth II: Poodle Girl Lost
by Dead Composer
Summary: Fern's been kidnapped! How far will The Brain go to save her?
1. Waiting to Go Again

This fic is rated PG for violence.

Disclaimer: Marc Brown owns the Arthur characters. He can keep D.W.

----

This is the story of two remarkable individuals—Tegan Powers and Raymond Mansch.

When Tegan Powers started first grade, she could already read at a fifth-grade level.

Sitting through school was a tedious chore for her, as she could easily read the important points from the teacher's mind before the lesson started. Her telepathy was a two-way street, as the pupils in the surrounding desks could see into her daydreams whether they wanted to or not. This proved especially awkward for the boys in her class, who over time began to avoid her.

Everyone who came within a short distance of Tegan was compelled to share her thoughts; she was unable to turn it off. The structure of her brain baffled scientists. Finally, when Tegan was seven and her little brother Alan (later known as The Brain) was three, the wonder girl was moved into a special school where she could be studied and protected. The world's greatest scientific minds came to visit her, and she assimilated their knowledge simply by standing next to them. The rare occasions on which she was allowed to venture into the world outside the school were carefully controlled. Her guardians knew of the vast potential, both for human advancement and for evil, inherent in her powers.

Her brother Alan was told nothing of her until he reached age ten. His parents feared that if he manifested unusual powers of his own, and then learned of Tegan's institutionalization, he might run away to avoid a similar fate. However, when a classmate of Alan's displayed a freakish ability to control the fears of others, and was transferred to the Ballford Preparatory School, his parents decided the time was right to reunite him with his lost sister.

When Raymond Mansch started first grade, he could already read at a fifth-grade level.

His advantage was not a telepathic gift, but two parents who valued his education over all. They banned him from TV and forced him to read constantly. As the years went by he stood head and shoulders above the other children his age in intellectual endeavors. Not only could he learn rapidly, but he displayed an incredible knack for problem solving.

Unfortunately, Mansch's moral development lagged far behind his mental development. He fell in with a ruthless crowd, and started to use his brilliance to plot and execute crimes. His passion for shiny objects led him to become a master jewel thief. His career enjoyed moderate success, and he eventually began to mentor others in the illicit arts. One of these was a young husband and father named Ben McDonald.McDonald was slick, clever, and loyal to Mansch; when he was captured and sentenced to prison after a heist, he declined to implicate his teacher. After several years of incarceration,McDonald was paroled for good behavior, and reunited with his wife and his daughter, Molly. Having found religion,McDonald rejected any further business with Mansch, much to his former partner's displeasure.

One morning whileMcDonald was away, Molly and her friend Binky found a diamond necklace hidden in his secret compartment. Believing her father had resumed his life of crime, Molly hurried to the police station with the stolen necklace. On the way she and Binky had an altercation with Mansch, which led Molly to realize that the master thief must have planted the necklace in order to frame her father. Unsure of how to thwart the wily criminal's scheme and protect her father, Molly chose to take the blame for the diamond theft on herself. Binky went along with the deception, and the two kids were sentenced to juvenile detention, in spite of the glaring fact that their youth and inexperience made it impossible for them to have pulled off such a crime.

----

Sue Ellen had never seen Francine in a two-piece suit before. She had long ago given up hope of ever wearing one herself, since the plane accident in Africa had left her with unattractive scars. She and Francine were standing at the deep end of the Olympic-sized pool in the Elwood City Aquatic Center, the first time she had gone swimming since the murder of her parents.

"Last one in the pool is a rotten..." said Francine, but her curly-haired friend was in the water before she could finish.

The girls swam a few laps, then lounged at the side of the pool. More children arrived, and the pool became crowded. It was a Monday evening.

"I forgot how much fun swimming is," Sue Ellen remarked. "Now I want to swim all night."

Francine noticed a familiar boy walking toward them—an anthro-Pomeranian lad with fuzzy red hair, wearing blue boxer trunks. She observed that a woman who resembled the boy was sitting in a beach chair near the entrance to the pool area; this woman was fully dressed, and her attire was modest and obviously homemade. Based on previous experience, Francine knew that the boy was named Ezekiel "Zeke" England, and the woman was his mother.

"Uh-oh," she muttered to Sue Ellen. "Here comes Zeke."

The pom boy extended a hand to the cat girl. His skin was almost as red as his fur, suggesting that he spent much of his time laboring in the sun.

"This is Sue Ellen Armstrong," Francine introduced her. "She's in my class."

"I'm happy to meet you," said the boy politely as they shook hands.

"What school do you go to?" Sue Ellen asked him. "I don't think I've seen you at Lakewood."

"I'm home-schooled," Zeke replied.

Sue Ellen wasn't sure what the term "home-schooled" entailed, but she had seen so many patterns of education in other countries, that she didn't imagine it to be anything remarkable.

Then Zeke asked her an unexpected question. "Are you a Christian?"

She fumbled for a response. "Well, uh, I've been to some Christian churches before."

"Have you accepted Jesus as your savior?" was the pom boy's next inquiry.

"Uh, no, not really."

"Don't sweat it, Sue Ellen," said Francine casually. "He asks everybody the same thing."

"Call on the name of the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved," said Zeke flatly, and then he strode off to the pool and jumped in.

Sue Ellen shook her head in disbelief. "He just met me, and he's already trying to convert me."

"Just wait till you get to know him better," said Francine.

The girls swam for another hour. Zeke made a few more devoutly Christian remarks, and then left with his mother.

After they had showered and changed into their street clothes, Sue Ellen and Francine wandered into the lobby of the aquatic center. There Mrs. Frensky was waiting to pick up her daughter.

"I don't see Carla or Nigel anywhere," said Sue Ellen, looking around.

"So they're a little late," said the unconcerned Francine.

"I guess I'll wait." Sue Ellen took a seat on a bench. "'Bye, Francine."

She sat impatiently for half an hour, but there was no sign of the Ratburns.

Meanwhile, Francine was welcomed to her apartment by Muffy and Beat.

"You're not gonna believe this, Francine," Muffy told her. "The rumors are true. Binky's in juvie."

"Again?" said Francine in astonishment. "For how long? What did he do?"

"Supposedly he helped Molly steal some diamonds," said Beat.

Francine's jaw dropped. "Diamonds...? Real diamonds?"

"Big ones," said Muffy.

"I'm sure Molly's father is mixed up in it somehow," Beat speculated. "I guess the straight and narrow wasn't crooked enough for him."

The phone in the kitchen rang, and Mrs. Frensky picked it up.

"But Molly and Binky insist they acted alone," Muffy pointed out.

Francine shook her head. "Weird. Has anybody talked to them?"

"Fern and Buster have gone to the detention center to visit them," Beat replied.

"Good," said Francine. "This looks like another FernBusters mystery."

"Girls!" Mrs. Frensky called to them urgently. In one hand she gripped the phone receiver.

"What, Mom?" Francine responded.

"Nigel and Carla Ratburn are in the hospital."

----

to be continued


	2. Who ya gonna call? FernBusters!

A plexiglass barrier separated Fern and Buster from Binky and Molly at the visiting room of the Elwood City Juvenile Detention Center. The incarcerated kids wore their usual drab uniforms, and sported unworried smiles, as if they cared little about the fact that they were there.

"That's right," Molly boasted. "Binky and I broke into the museum and stole the diamonds on our own. My dad had nothing to do with it."

"We just talked to your dad," said Fern. "He has another explanation, and we think it's a good one. Mansch planted the diamonds in your dad's secret compartment. You were going to turn them in to the police when Mansch caught you with them. So you took the blame to protect your father."

"An interesting idea," said Molly. "But can you prove it?" Her hazel eyes, visible now that the hair overhanging her face had been shorn, bore a hint of pleading.

"We'll do our best," Buster promised. Behind the chairs on which he and Fern sat, a poodle woman in a police uniform stood motionlessly and listened intently to their conversation.

"Guess who's in here with us," said Binky. "Dudley Proctor."

Fern's and Buster's eyes widened at the sound of their former classmate's name.

"How'd he end up in juvie?" Buster wondered.

"He and some kids at his new school vandalized the principal's car," Binky replied.

"How's he doing?" asked Fern.

"Fine," said Molly, "as long as he has us to protect him."

As they spoke, Dudley the rat boy strolled into the washroom of the boys' quarters, clutching a toothbrush in one hand and a toothpaste tube in the other.

Unfortunately, he wasn't alone in the room. "Hey, what are you doing in here?" a rough voice called to him. "This is the boys' room."

Two larger boys stood imposingly before him—a stocky, muscular monkey boy, and a rather skinny-looking boy whose oddly-shaped head face suggested that his lineage included both ducks and horses.

"Indeed it is," Dudley answered politely, though a bit anxiously. "And I'm a boy."

"I don't think you are," said the skinny boy mockingly. "C'mon, Brick, let's take a look."

"I find your lack of manners appalling," Dudley scolded the pair.

"You'll lack something by the time we're done with you," the monkey boy threatened.

"Where are your big friends now?" asked the skinny boy as he stepped closer.

Dudley's big friends were, at the moment, wrapping up their visit with Buster and Fern.

"I'll see you guys later," said Binky with a grin. "I mean, if I ever get out of this place."

After Fern and Buster had waved their farewells, they wandered away from the visiting room and discussed their next move. "Maybe we should leave this case to the police," Fern suggested.

"No way," said Buster with determination. "We didn't fail Binky when someone wrote his name all over the school, and we won't fail him now."

"But Mansch is a dangerous criminal," Fern insisted.

"Stop being such a girl," Buster chided her. "He won't suspect a couple of kids. Now here's my plan."

----

Sue Ellen had already whistled all the tunes she knew, as well as all the tunes Francine knew. She had gone over the plot of the latest _Series of Ill-Conceived Alliterations_ book in her mind, but her ride still hadn't arrived. It was starting to appear that she would be trapped at the aquatic center for the rest of her life. _If Alan were here_, she thought, _he'd probably say that Carla and Nigel were caught up in a time-space warp and sent 75 years into the future._

A car pulled in front of the building, but it wasn't the Ratburns—it was Francine and her mother. They hurried into the building, and their solemn faces suggested bad news.

"Omigosh," said Francine with concern. "You must have been waiting here forever."

"Feels like it," Sue Ellen remarked. "What happened to Carla and Nigel?"

"They're in the hospital," Mrs. Frensky answered.

Fear welled up in the cat girl's stomach. "Wh-what?" she stammered. "Why?"

"Food poisoning," the monkey woman explained. "They stopped at a Japanese place while you were swimming, and ate some bad sushi."

"Oh, no," Sue Ellen mourned. "How long will they be in the hospital?"

"The doctor said they may be there for three or four days," said Francine.

Sue Ellen's eyes became moist as the Frenskys led her to their car. "Now there's no one to take care of me," she lamented. "I'm all alone again."

"You can sleep in Catherine's bed tonight," Mrs. Frensky offered.

"What about tomorrow night?" asked Francine.

"We'll see what can be arranged."

As they drove along the highway, Sue Ellen begged Mrs. Frensky to take her to the hospital so she could visit her temporary guardians, the Ratburns, but the woman's responses were noncommittal.

When they arrived at Westboro Apartments, Sue Ellen lazily watched TV while Mrs. Frensky made a few phone calls. "Hello, Mrs. Read? The Ratburns are sick, so I was wondering if you could spare your guest bedroom for... Oh, he is? I'm sorry to hear that. Thanks anyway."

Similarly, Mrs. Powers told her that they were expecting an occupant in their guest bedroom, and Mrs. Crosswire said that their condo was undergoing renovation. As Mrs. Frensky hung up the phone, Francine tapped her on the hip. "Why can't she stay with us until the Ratburns get better?" she asked.

Her mother made a weary face. "My new teaching job is stressful. I don't need another little girl to take care of right now."

Francine glared at her, unconvinced of her sincerity. "Why don't you ship me off to someone else's house while you're at it? Then you'll have plenty of time on your hands."

Mrs. Frensky shot her an annoyed look, and turned to pick up the phone again.

"Oh, I get it," said Francine accusingly. "You're afraid the people who killed her parents will come after us."

Her mother seemed to ignore the bitter remark as she dialed Mrs. McGrady's number.

----

By morning, Mrs. Frensky still hadn't found a place where Sue Ellen could stay. She drove the girls to school, whipping into the parking lot just as a familiar moose woman emerged from her convertible in the next slot over.

"Hello, Mrs. Frensky," said Mrs. Krantz in her usual high-pitched, grating voice. "Hi, Francine and Sue Ellen. Are you ready for another exciting day of school?"

"Another?" Francine joked. "I'm still waiting for my first."

The girls recounted the latest events of their lives as they followed their teacher into the building. "And it looks like they'll be in the hospital for the rest of the week," said Sue Ellen.

"You poor thing," said Mrs. Krantz sympathetically. "First you lose your parents, and now this. If you need a place to stay, Arnold and I have an extra room."

"Uh, that's very kind of you to offer."

Yet in her heart, Sue Ellen felt uneasy at the prospect of living at her teacher's house, even if only for a few days.

In her imagination, she was organizing plates, napkins, and silverware on the dining table in Mrs. Krantz' house. "I'm done with the place settings," she announced as she finished the task.

The moose woman scanned the table carefully. "The salad fork goes to the left of the dinner fork," she said coldly. "Ten percent off your next spelling test."

As the meal progressed, Sue Ellen ate ravenously while Gladys and Arnold Krantz slowly ingested their steaks and salad. "You're chewing with your mouth open," Mrs. Krantz scolded the girl. "For that, you get twice as much math homework."

When they had finished eating, Mr. Krantz turned to his wife and smiled. "That was a fine meal, dear."

Then the pleasant silence was shattered by the sound of a rude underleg noise.

The Krantzes looked at each other, then looked at Sue Ellen, who shrugged innocently. "In Saudi Arabia it's considered a compliment," she remarked.

Mrs. Krantz scowled disapprovingly at her. "It's summer school for you," she said menacingly.

As she laid her bag on the desk and sat down, Sue Ellen chided herself for being so paranoid. After all, Nigel Ratburn was a teacher, and living with him and Carla was tolerable enough. But what if she had lived in Mr. Ratburn's house while she was in his third-grade class?

It was Tuesday morning, the third week of the school year, and all the kids in Mrs. Krantz' class were present with the notable exception of Binky. The line-up included girls Muffy, Sue Ellen, Beat, Francine, and Fern, and boys Arthur, George, Buster, and Van.

In Mr. Boughton's sixth-grade classroom, Alan, Prunella, Marina, and Mickie Chanel were among those discussing the unexplained absence of C.V. Oberlin from their midst. Not one of them missed him terribly, as he had spent most of the previous school day tormenting them and the rest of the student body with his strange ability to trigger fear in others. Only Alan knew the truth about C.V.'s current whereabouts, but he pretended to be as ignorant as his classmates.

The teacher, a zebra man, called the roll and then asked for questions. Alan raised his hand.

"This weekend my sister is coming to our house to stay for a while," he announced to the other pupils.

Surprised gasps spread through the room. "I didn't know you had a sister," Prunella marveled. "Why didn't you tell us about her before?"

"I guess I forgot," said Alan. "She goes to a special school. Her name's Tegan, and she's 14." There was much more he could say about her, but he dared not.

Throughout the school day Alan's friends bombarded him with questions about the mysterious sister whose existence he had suddenly revealed.

"Is she smart like you?" asked Arthur.

"She's an alien," George theorized. "That's why he kept her a secret."

"I wonder if anyone else has an unknown sibling," said Muffy suspiciously.

"I do," Van joked. "There's really twelve of us Cooper kids."

By the end of the school day, more than twenty of the kids had made arrangements to greet Tegan Powers when she made her debut on Friday afternoon.

----

Buster sat on the porch in front of his condominium after school, reading a joke book and waiting for Fern to arrive. A few minutes passed, and he saw a poodle boy crossing the street in his direction. The boy wore a ragged T-shirt, shorts, safety pads, and a helmet, and he toted a skateboard.

As he drew closer, Buster realized to his astonishment that the boy wasn't a boy at all. He leaped to his feet, his eyes wide. "Omigosh, you had me totally fooled."

"You asked me to stop being a girl," said the boyish-looking Fern. "So I did."

"You didn't have to do this," said Buster, marveling at how little Fern resembled a girl in her current guise.

"I figured Mansch would get suspicious if he saw a girl on a skateboard," said Fern sagely. "I've played boys before. It's easy. All I have to do is change my clothes, take out my hair ribbon, and look stupid."

Buster picked up his skateboard and helmet, which he had laid on the porch. "Let's get going, then. Since Mansch is a crook, he probably doesn't work a 9-to-5 schedule."

On the sidewalk across from Raymond Mansch's house, Buster tried to teach Fern (or Ferdinand, as "he" wished to be called) the finer points of skateboarding. Half an hour had passed, and Fern had fallen on her rear end about thirteen times, when they saw a fancy-looking Mercedes pull into the garage of the Mansch home.

"There he is!" exclaimed Buster, pointing.

"Don't point," Fern warned him. "Act inconspicuous."

"I can't even pronounce inconspicuous," said Buster.

They went on with the skateboarding lesson, pretending as if they were unaware of Mansch's presence. The short cat man, however, was observing them through the draped window of his kitchen.

"Hmm," he mused. "I haven't seen those boys before."

Reaching into a nearby cabinet, he drew out a digital camera with a telephoto lens...

----

Dudley Green, formerly Dudley Proctor, formerly Dolly Proctor, was the most miserable rat boy in the world, and possibly the most miserable boy of any species. It wasn't just the pain from his broken nose, but also the grim realization that the brutes who had beaten him were typical representatives of the gender that had been forced upon him.

"I hope those punks get whacked really good," grumbled Mr. Green, his adoptive father, who was driving his family away from the hospital.

"The bright side is, you get out of juvie a week early," said Mrs. Green, his adoptive mother.

"There is no bright side," mourned Dudley, running his fingers over the bandages and braces that held his nose together.

At his request, his new parents stopped by the real estate agency where his "aunt Augusta" worked. His mother escorted him into the offices, then sat in the waiting area while the unhappy boy stepped into the room where Augusta Winslow had her desk.

The blond rabbit woman gasped at the sight of Dudley's injured face. "Good heavens! What happened?"

"Boys happened," Dudley complained, tears starting to wet the bandages on his nose. "Boys are unruly savages by nature, and now that I'm one of them, I can't keep myself out of trouble."

"I'm so sad for you," said Augusta earnestly. She seemed tired and a bit pale, as if she had experienced a difficult, sleepless night. There was a faint, odd smell in the room.

"It's been half a year," said Dudley impatiently. "Have you made any progress towards finding a spell to turn me back into a girl?"

Augusta only lowered her face in sadness.

"Are you even trying?" Dudley tried to raise his voice in anger, but the pain from his bruised and broken face prevented him.

The rabbit woman didn't speak. It seemed to him as if she was concealing dreadful news that would break his heart even further.

"You don't care what happens to me," he said indignantly. "You have your boyfriend from the stars to make you happy, but I have nothing."

Augusta finally spoke, slowly and somberly.

"I can't help you, Dudley. I've given up my magical powers."

The words stung like a dagger through the rat boy's heart.

"You know that there are two of me," Augusta went on. "I'm the one who went to the planet Kron with Dr. Portinari. The other one was taken into custody by the Kron, so I returned to take her place."

Dudley only nodded, wondering how a lengthy explanation would help to ease his suffering.

"The Kron studied my powers while I was on their planet. They concluded that I could easily lose control of them, and cause tremendous damage to the universe. They offered to perform a surgical modification on my brain that would take away my Wicasta gift."

Dudley waited breathessly for the hammer blow that would destroy all hope.

"I accepted."

Augusta opened her mouth to say more, but not before Dudley burst into tears and fled from her office.

His mother embraced and cuddled him as she led him back to the car, but nothing could console him. As he rode away from the real estate office, still overwhelmed by grief, it occurred to him what the odd smell in Augusta's office was. Alcohol.

----

to be continued


	3. Her Teacher's House

After Mrs. Krantz had taken Sue Ellen to the Ratburn house to collect her belongings, and then to the hospital to visit Carla and Nigel, she drove the girl to her own modest home. The exterior painfully reminded her of the house where she had lived with her parents—the house that was now for sale. The oddest thing about the front of the house was the presence of a shabby-looking scarecrow attached to a pole, in spite of the fact that there was no garden to be seen.

"What's the scarecrow for?" Sue Ellen asked Mrs. Krantz.

"To scare away the crows," was the teacher's simple response.

"I don't see any crows," said the cat girl, who then realized she had been suckered into a joke.

The inside of the house was rather generic, with brown leather furniture, a wide-screen TV, various potted plants, and framed paintings of pastoral scenes on the walls.

"Make yourself at home, okaaaay?" said Mrs. Krantz in her usual screechy voice. As she started to putter about in the kitchen, Sue Ellen walked up to one of the larger paintings, which was identified by its inscription as a scene from the Scottish highlands.

As she tried to remember if she had ever visited the place, she heard an enthusiastic cry from another room. "Oh, yes! TOUCHDOWN!"

She walked into the room, expecting to see a man with a six-pack of beer and a bag of cheese curls enjoying a televised football game. What she saw instead was a moose man with a belly large enough to keep a six-pack cold, sitting in front of a computer screen, waving his arms triumphantly. There was no bed in the room, but an abundance of shelves with all manner of knick-knacks and electronic devices, including ham radios, old action figures, and even a scale model of the starship Enterprise.

The moose man looked down at the girl and grinned. "You must be Sue Elaine," he said in a voice almost as high-pitched and grating as his wife's. "I'm Arnold."

"Nice to meet you," said Sue Ellen. Sticking out her hand, she received a firm shake from the man. "Why did you say 'touchdown' just now?" she asked curiously.

"I'm playing Fantasy Football," the man explained. "It's an online game where you pretend to manage a football team and play against other managers."

He then stood up and showed Sue Ellen around the room. "I collect a lot of stuff," he boasted. "Gladys likes to call me a pack rat."

"You collect toys?" The cat girl reached toward a robot figure standing on a shelf, but Mr. Krantz blocked her hand.

"Don't touch that," he cautioned. "My Transmogrifier figures are worth thousands of dollars. I've had them for more than twenty years."

Sue Ellen pointed at a large poster attached to the wall, bearing the image of a shapely woman in a tight uniform, whose face appeared to have wires and circuits running across it. "Who's that?" she wondered.

"That's Eleven of Nine," Mr. Krantz told her.

"What are those things on her face?" Sue Ellen asked.

"Those are implants."

"Okay." The girl's next question was, "What are those things on her chest?"

Soon Mrs. Krantz had dinner ready—steaks and salad, ominously. Sue Ellen ate ravenously, as the sick Ratburns had been unable to provide her with lunch money. The moose couple didn't appear concerned about her table manners or lack thereof.

She finished her meal quickly, then asked to be excused from the table. "Of course," said Mr. Krantz warmly. "Why don't you go in the living room and pick a record to listen to, and when we're done, you can tell us all about the places where you've lived."

Sue Ellen had no trouble finding the record collection on the shelf containing the home entertainment system. She recalled how many of her friends had marveled at seeing an LP for the first time, thinking it was a giant CD with twice as much music. As for herself, she grew up with albums, having never seen a CD until she moved to Elwood.

She thumbed through the available selections, muttering, "Simon and Garfunkel... Simon and Garfunkel... Simon and Garfunkel..."

"If you don't like Simon and Garfunkel," called Mr. Krantz from the dining room, "we also have some James Taylor."

She finally settled on an album by Tyrone Bellows, entitled, "I Love You More Than the Girl in the Other Song".

----

Having spent another afternoon skateboarding and spying in front of Mansch's house, Fern and Buster stopped in at the Sugar Bowl. The venerable ice cream shop had seen a decrease in patronage since the Muffin Man coffee house opened nearby, but it maintained its reputation as The Place to Hang Out After School.

At one of the tables, Beat was quizzing Buster and Fern about their findings. "I wish I could take part in your surveillance activities," said the British girl, looking over Fern's boyish disguise with amusement. "However, as you can see, I've passed the point where I can convincingly masquerade as a boy."

"You'd be bored anyway," said Buster. "So far nothing interesting has happened. We haven't seen any shady characters go in and out of his house."

As they discussed the situation with Binky and Molly, Beat's cell phone rang. "I've got a call," she told her friends.

"We'll talk some more later," said Fern as she and Buster rose from the table.

Once the pair had walked out of the ice cream shop, Buster glanced about suspiciously. About a block away he saw a short man standing on a corner. The man had a hippie-like mop of shaggy hair on his scalp, and what appeared to be an elephant face.

"Hmm," Buster thought aloud. "I think that guy's been following us."

"Or maybe he's just going in the same direction," Fern suggested. "Things like that happen."

Inside the Sugar Bowl, Beat was talking animatedly with Muffy over her phone. "A dress sale? Fab! Yes, I'd love to go. Thanks for bringing it to my attention."

What she didn't notice was a dark-complexioned boy with pointed ears, who stood near the ice cream bar and watched her intently. Once she ended her cell phone conversation, the boy, who appeared to be in his mid-teens, walked up to her table. "Hello," he said in a friendly tone. "Are you new?"

Beat was slightly taken aback by the boy's greeting. "New? You mean, new to the neighborhood? No, I've been here for more than a year."

"Then I wonder why I haven't seen you before," said the boy, sitting down unbidden opposite her. "My name's Alberto. Alberto Molina."

"I'm pleased to meet you," said the rabbit-aardvark girl. "I'm Beatrice Simon, but you can call me Beat."

"Are you from England?" asked Alberto.

"Yes, I am," Beat replied. "London. Where are you from?"

"I'm from Guayaquil, Ecuador."

"Really," Beat remarked with intrigue. "A friend of mine has been there. She brought back a Panama hat, and postcards from the yacht tour to the Galapagos islands."

"I never saw the Galapagos," Alberto lamented. "My family was poor. We came to the United States so my father could find a better job. He's a barber."

"Come to think of it," mused Beat, "I believe there's a new little girl at my school who comes from South America. She looks somewhat like you."

"That would be my sister, Vicita."

The conversation sailed on, as Beat and Alberto abandoned all thought of ice cream.

As they talked, a short man with shaggy hair and an elephant trunk for a nose stopped briefly at the entrance to the Sugar Bowl, and glanced inside...

----

to be continued


	4. Kidnapped!

The bare sepia walls of the Krantz guest bedroom cried out for something to decorate them, like travel posters. Unfortunately, Sue Ellen had lost her posters a long time ago, sometime between her sudden move from Elwood City and the murder of her parents. It seemed a comfortable enough room to a little girl who had, on occasion, slept in mud huts or underneath mosquito nets.

"Sleep well, okaaaay?" said Mrs. Krantz in her usual sickly sweet tone as she tucked Sue Ellen in. Then she leaned over, careful not to knock over the lamp on the nightstand with her antlers, and kissed the cat girl on the forehead.

Once her hostess had left the room, Sue Ellen performed the one daily ritual that was more indispensable to her than brushing her teeth. Writing in her journal.

"Dear Diary. My teacher just kissed me. It wasn't gross, it was just weird. When I first came to stay with Mrs. Krantz, I was afraid she would grade me on everything I did. Now I'm afraid she'll give me special treatment. Her husband is a little on the geeky side. If I were Buster, I'd say they're both space aliens."

----

The next morning was Wednesday, and Sue Ellen had the privilege of riding to school in Mrs. Krantz' convertible. "Buying a convertible was the best thing we ever did," the teacher remarked. "We don't have to worry about scraping the ceiling with our antlers."

Sue Ellen glanced around nervously as the moose woman led her toward the classroom. She knew what would surely follow if any of her friends saw her in such intimate company with her teacher.

Ahead of them, Muffy and Alan were having a chat. "I've booked Pickles the Clown for the party," Muffy told the bear boy. "I've also asked Arthur's dad to..."

"There's not going to be a party," Alan informed her. "You'll meet my sister, then you'll go home."

Muffy scowled. "Come on, Alan. Don't you think your sister deserves a better reception than that?"

"I don't want to attract too much attention," said Alan secretively. "If you want to be helpful, you can split the guests into groups of four, and arrange for one group to visit every half hour."

As Muffy was about to make an incredulous comment, she saw Sue Ellen walk past with Mrs. Krantz' hand on her shoulder. "Look at that," she said, pointing rudely. "Sue Ellen just discovered the secret to getting good grades."

"You mean studying hard?" said Alan.

"No. Cozying up to the teacher."

Muffy's mockery was loud enough for Sue Ellen to hear, and it pained her soul.

Hers was normally the first name to be read in the roll call, but Mrs. Krantz skipped it that morning, going directory to Binky (who, of course, wasn't there). All the other kids were required to announce their presence as part of the routine, but Sue Ellen was exempted. The special treatment had begun.

By lunchtime, she was getting it from every direction. "The history test is tomorrow, and I'm not ready for it," Buster requested of her. "Do you think you can talk Mrs. Krantz into cutting me a deal?"

Francine, however, remained steadily sympathetic. "I wish my mom would've let you stay," she said to Sue Ellen in the cafeteria. "Living with the teacher must not be fun at all."

"Oh, it's okay," said the cat girl with a shrug.

Both Muffy and Beat received calls on their cell phones while they were enjoying lunch.

"Hi, Beat, it's Alberto."

"Muffy, this is Babette Green, Dudley's mother."

While Beat's conversation with Alberto was one of delight, Muffy's exchange with Mrs. Green took a somber turn.

"Yes, Alberto, I'd love to meet you at the Sugar Bowl."

"He won't go to school. He won't eat. The only thing he wants to do is lie in bed and cry."

"My teacher asked for a five-page report, but I was so fascinated by the subject, I wrote ten pages."

"You're one of his best friends. Your advice has helped him in the past."

"I'll see you after school," said Beat, closing her cell phone and smiling wistfully.

"I'll come over as soon as school lets out," said Muffy, closing her cell phone and grimacing hopelessly. What could she do for someone who had suffered such a grim fate?

----

After school, Beat once again met with Buster and the boyishly-dressed Fern at the Sugar Bowl. "We haven't seen Mansch do anything suspicious yet," said Buster, "but as they say, the third time's a charm."

"I've been doing some Internet research on him," said Fern. "He was suspected in a number of jewel robberies, but he was never indicted due to lack of evidence."

"From the sound of it, you're dealing with a master," Beat cautioned them. "Don't underestimate him."

Buster and Fern strode away, clutching skateboards under their arms. Five minutes later, Alberto Molina wandered into the ice cream shop and appeared overjoyed to see Beat alone at a table.

"Hullo, Alberto," she greeted the Ecuadorian boy. "I trust you had a good day at school."

"I survived it, if that's what you mean. What about you?"

"My class isn't very challenging," Beat admitted. "Maybe I should skip a grade, but I don't feel like going to all the trouble."

"I think you should," said Alberto. "The sooner you graduate, the better."

"It's too early for me to think about graduation," said Beat.

Alberto took a deep breath and summoned his courage. "Beatrice, can I ask you to go to a movie with me on Saturday?"

Beat's eyes lit up. "Oh, that would be lovely! But I'll have to ask my mum if it's all right. What picture do you have in mind?"

"_You Only Die Tomorrow_," Alberto replied. "The latest James Hound movie."

"I can't," said Beat with regret. "It's PG-13."

As Alberto mulled her response, a startling realization hit him. When he had called her during lunch, he had heard loud voices of children in the background...

"Beatrice," he asked in a hushed tone, "how old are you?"

"I'll be ten in a week," the girl replied unhesitatingly.

It was all Alberto could do to keep his jaw from dropping.

"How old did you think I was?" asked Beat, concerned by the boy's look of utter embarrassment.

Too horrified to answer, Alberto rose to his feet and walked hastily out of the ice cream shop. As Beat curiously watched him go, the nature and depth of his confusion slowly dawned upon her.

She looked down at her prematurely developed body, and dropped her head into her hands. "Oh, bugger," she moaned.

----

True to her promise, Muffy persuaded her mother to drive her to Dudley's house, where she hoped to afford some semblance of comfort to the girl-turned-boy. She had taken a liking to Bob and Babette Green, the friendly couple who had adopted Dudley. Having enjoyed no success at reproducing on their own (partly due to the fact that Bob was a dog man and Babette was a cat woman), they had jumped at the chance of welcoming the troubled boy into their family.

"He's in his room," said Babette, motioning toward the door that still hung open. "I hope the sight of bandages doesn't bother you."

It did, but Muffy pressed bravely forward. Once she had overcome the initial shock of Dudley's pale, forlorn expression and the dressings on his grossly swollen rat nose, she simply sat on the edge of the bed next to him, pulled him by the arm into a sitting position, and fondly embraced him. They remained in each other's arms for several minutes, as Dudley wept profusely and Muffy grew impatient.

"I-I'll never be a girl again," the rat boy sobbed. "And I'm doing terribly as a boy."

"Oh, Dudley, Dudley." Muffy leaned backwards, drew a handkerchief from her pocket, and used it to wipe the tears from the shoulder of her dress. "You're blaming all your problems on the fact that you're a boy."

"Boys are brutes," said Dudley with a mournful sniffle. "Look what they did to me. And I'm just like them."

"Girls can be cruel too," said Muffy. "Just look at me. I've hurt a lot of people's feelings."

"As soon as my nose heals," said Dudley gloomily, "I'll be back to my old tricks again. I just know it."

"You have a choice," said Muffy with firmness.

She cradled the despondent boy in her arms for another minute, then an idea occurred to her. "What you need is a girlfriend."

Dudley groaned. "Who would want to be my girlfriend? I'm a freak."

"Don't worry about that," said Muffy. "Look at Augusta. She's a freak, but look at the great boyfriend she found."

"Um, I think you should check on that," said Dudley with sudden uncertainty.

"What do you mean?"

"I went to her office yesterday," Dudley related. "She didn't look well, and I think she's been drinking. I suspect she's no longer happily involved with her spaceman friend."

"Oh, dear," muttered Muffy with sudden concern.

----

"The faster you go, the easier it is to keep your balance," Buster explained to Fern, who had fallen on her posterior for what seemed like the hundredth time. "It's just like riding a bike."

As the poodle girl righted herself and stepped onto the skateboard for yet another attempt, her sensitive ears picked up the sound of a door closing. Glancing carefully across the street, she saw Mansch walking away from his house, grinning nonchalantly. In one hand he clutched a black leather briefcase.

He strolled down the sidewalk, whistling, to the surprise of the two kids who had never seen him leave home in anything other than the Mercedes.

"Let's follow him," Buster suggested. "Maybe the other diamond necklaces are in his briefcase."

"Good idea," Fern replied. "But let's wait till he's two blocks away before we start. We can't let him see us."

Once Mansch was a good distance away, Buster and Fern went into action, cautiously trailing the cat man. They prepared themselves to hide behind a fence or tree if he ever looked over his shoulder, but he behaved in a carefree, unsuspecting manner.

He turned right after three blocks, and walked in a straight line as the two kids followed. "Whoever he's going to see must not live far away," Buster whispered to Fern.

They went on for half a mile, leaving the familiar parts of the neighborhood far behind, and then Mansch wandered onto a beaten path through a field full of trees and bushes. A tall chain-link fence with barbed wire at the top lined the near edge of the field. "Maybe we should turn back," said Fern timidly. "I don't like the looks of this place."

"The FernBusters never turn back," said Buster fearlessly.

Fern swallowed, then marched onward after Buster. Mansch stayed close to the fence, on which were posted several NO TRESPASSING signs.

As they kept a distance of about one hundred yards behind the cat man, the two young sleuths gazed curiously at the property on the other side of the threatening fence. A simple wooden house sat in the middle of the acreage, with an extensive garden planted to the right. Various toys and pieces of junk were strewn across the lawn. A tire swing dangled from a strong-looking oak tree.

They walked a few more yards, and were greeted by an odd sound, and an equally odd sight. Two large, fierce-looking Dobermans lay in the grass near the fence, snoring and occasionally whining, but not moving a muscle. "Some guard dogs," said Buster jokingly. "Asleep on the job."

Fern was about to nod in amused agreement, when it occurred to her that the two dogs should have been awakened to their duty by the noise, or at very least the scent, of the passing people.

Then a frightening possibility occurred to her.

Stepping closer to the fence, she whistled to the dormant beasts. "Hey, dogs. Wake up and bark at us." The Dobermans only continued to snore.

She turned to Buster, stark fear in her eyes. "They've been drugged."

The rabbit boy and the poodle girl stared at each other for a second, trying to grasp each other's thoughts.

When Buster finally realized what Fern was implying, he did the wisest thing he could think of. He turned around and fled in terror.

And just in time, as a man wearing a ski mask burst out of the nearby bushes and vainly tried to seize him.

Fern started to scream, but a strong hand wrapped itself around her mouth, muffling her cry.

It was enough to alert Buster, who stopped in mid-flight and whirled about. "Fern!" he shrieked at the sight of the two masked men placing a burlap bag over the girl's head. "Help! Police! Help!"

After glancing briefly in Buster's direction, one of the men snatched up Fern and wrapped his arms tightly around the wriggling girl's chest. He and his partner then rushed away at top speed.

"Stop!" cried Buster frantically, running after the men. "Help! Police!" Fern's abductors quickly outpaced the rabbit boy, disappearing into a thicket of trees.

He slowed and came to a halt, panting and desperate. As his mind raced in confusion, he heard a boy's voice shouting to him from behind. "Over here!"

Without bothering to ask the caller to identify himself, Buster hurried in the direction of the voice. Through the bushes and bristling pine trees before him, the image of a fuzzy-headed Pomeranian boy became clear.

A heavily-locked gate had been opened, allowing Buster to pass freely through the fence. Once inside, he stopped and placed his hands on his knees to rest. "You can call the police from my house," said the straight-faced pom lad.

Relieved by the offer, the winded rabbit boy turned, intending to follow the boy to the small wooden house—only to see the muzzle of a shotgun trained at his face.

----

to be continued


	5. Fanatics

He had gone from the frying pan into the pressure cooker. After having narrowly escaped being kidnapped along with Fern, Buster now found himself staring into the business end of a gun. He stood petrified, not knowing what to say or how to save himself from doom.

The other end of the shotgun was held by a rather tall, unshaven Pomeranian man with a bulging right eye that seemed to have been injured somehow. He glared grimly at Buster while the pom boy, apparently his son, merely watched the showdown emotionlessly.

"Can you be trusted?" asked the armed man with a gruff voice.

"Y-yeah," Buster stammered, if only because he knew a "no" answer would surely get his head blown off.

The pom man slowly lowered his shotgun, then motioned with his head toward the wooden house. "Inside," he ordered. "And you'd better not be lying."

It would be a very memorable day, thought Buster as he nervously followed the boy along the stone walk leading to the house. The father strode behind them, holding the shotgun at his side.

"Sorry about my dad and his gun," said the pom boy to Buster. "He's really careful about who he lets into the property."

"Especially when I hear some kid screaming for the police," his father added.

"My name's Zeke," said the boy as he reached out to open the battered screen door.

"I'm Buster," replied the bunny. "Can we speed things up? My friend's in trouble."

Once inside, he hurried to the phone on the wall, barely registering his surroundings. What he did notice was that the family sorely needed new furniture, as the upholstery on the old set was filled with holes and scratches. Chunks of sliced vegetables covered the kitchen counter, and the shelves were lined with religious books.

As Buster grabbed the receiver and dialed 911, a pom woman in an old floral dress walked into the room, holding a baby in her arms. "Who's this, Elbert?" she asked the man, who was replacing his shotgun in a closet containing a variety of firearms.

"His name's Buster," Zeke chimed in.

"I asked your father," the woman scolded him. "Don't speak out of turn."

The Englands—Elbert, Emma, son Zeke, and baby Elizabeth—appeared none too pleased when two police cars parked in front of their gate. Buster rushed out to greet them, speaking a mile a minute as he described Fern's abduction.

"You officers are welcome to come inside," Mr. England offered a bit grudgingly. "But if you choose to do so, let me make something perfectly clear—everything you see, I own legally."

The flood of worried people continued. Fern's distraught parents were next, followed by Bitzi and Harry Mills. As the word spread, some of Buster's classmates arrived at the scene--Arthur, Francine, Beat, and George. Mr. England spent most of his time standing next to his gun closet as the visitors wandered in and out of his house. Mrs. England, meanwhile, busied herself trying to revive the Dobermans with smelling salts.

"The men came out of these bushes," recounted Buster with a sweep of his arm, as Mr. and Mrs. Walters looked on. "I ran away just in time, but they caught Fern and put a bag over her head. I chased them, but they were too fast."

"Those awful men," mourned the tearful Mrs. Walters. "What could they want with my baby?"

"I know you were doing some investigating with her," said Mr. Walters to Buster. "Do you have any idea who did this?"

"Yes, I do," Buster replied. "It was Mansch. He tricked us into following him, then led us to where his goons were hiding."

"You shouldn't have followed," Mrs. Walters scolded him.

"We didn't know we were in danger until Fern figured out the dogs had been drugged," Buster explained.

Meanwhile, Francine was introducing her friends to Zeke, whom she knew from the aquatic center. "This is Arthur, this is George, and this is Beatrice."

"Call me Beat," said the British girl.

"I'm happy to meet you," said the pom boy. "Are you Christians?"

Francine turned her face away and rolled her eyes.

"I'm a Christian," said Arthur.

"Me too," added George.

"I'm non-religious," said Beat.

"Call upon the name of the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved," Zeke advised her.

"I'll call upon the Lord Jesus as soon as I find out which flat he's staying in," Beat joked.

"This is no joke," said the pom boy seriously. "An awful hell awaits those who don't believe."

"I know a boy you would like," said Beat, reaching for her cell phone.

Several minutes later, Mel Cooper hung up his phone in astonishment. Clutching the slip of paper on which he had written the Englands' address according to Beat's dictation, he hurried from the study into the living room. His children Logan, Van, and Dallin were idly watching TV, while his daughter Odette was practicing ballet in the bedroom she had to herself since her sister Quinn had left for college. In the kitchen, wife Valerie was coaching toddler Megan in the proper manner of eating pork chops.

Mr. Cooper walked up to his sons and spoke in a low tone so that Odette wouldn't hear over her classical music. "Fern Walters has been kidnapped."

The boys' faces blanched. "Omigosh, no!" Van exclaimed.

"Dude, not Fern," said Logan worriedly.

Hearing the loud voices, Odette stopped dancing and stepped out of her room. "What is it?" she asked curiously.

"It doesn't concern you," Mr. Cooper admonished the swan girl.

"Fern's been kidnapped!" Van blurted out.

Odette nearly choked from the shock. "K-kid-kid..."

"You and your big beak," Mr. Cooper chided his wheelchair-bound boy.

Quickly recovering her composure, Odette folded her arms indignantly. "And why doesn't that concern me?" she demanded.

Her father ignored the question. "Odette, you stay here and take care of Dallin and Megan. The rest of you are coming with me."

"Why can't I come?" Odette insisted.

"You've seen enough of kidnappings for one lifetime," said Mr. Cooper firmly.

"Hmph!" grunted the swan girl, and trudged back into her room.

Not long afterward, the Cooper family's Buick joined the swarm of cars on the usually empty street running by the Englands' property. Logan unfolded Van's chair and helped him into it, then the clan made its way through the gate. While Mr. and Mrs. Cooper spoke with the Walters outside of the house, Van and Logan greeted the kids inside.

"Is it true?" Van asked Buster. "Has Fern really been kidnapped?"

"I saw it happen," said Buster seriously. "They almost got me, too."

At Beat's prompting, Zeke approached Van with a characteristically blunt remark. "I understand you're a Christian."

"Yeah, I am," Van replied.

"How'd you get crippled?" the pom boy inquired.

"Run over by a car."

"Too bad," said Zeke flatly. "But such things can be overcome by faith."

"And a good wheelchair," said Van, patting the leather cover on the armrest of his chair.

"Jesus healed the sick," said Zeke, this time more earnestly. "He gave sight to the blind. He caused the lame to walk."

"Did you hear that, Van?" said Francine, trying to lighten the tone. "He called you lame."

In the yard, Van's parents faced the same attitude as they conversed with the Englands. "We home-school our boy," Mr. England told them. "There's too much evil being taught in the schools. Evolution, atheism, socialism..."

"And those horrible Henry Skreever books," Mrs. England added. "They promote devil worship."

"Did you know Dungeons and Dragons was created by real witches?" said Mr. England. "My mother caught me with some of those books, and she burned them, thank goodness."

"So many children are disappearing nowadays," Mrs. England reflected sadly. "I think they're being used as human sacrifices by devil cults. I never dreamed it would happen right outside our door."

Having no success in steering the conversation in a direction that didn't involve satanic influences, Mr. Cooper motioned for his wife to leave. They went and stood behind the oak tree with the tire swing, out of earshot of the others.

"These people are fanatics," the duck man declared.

"I think you're being harsh," Mrs. Cooper retorted. "There's nothing wrong with protecting your children from evil."

"It was this sort of fanaticism that led to our daughter's kidnapping," said her husband.

"It was not!" Mrs. Cooper insisted. "They aren't like those awful polygamists at all."

"But it's the same us-against-the-world mentality."

"I don't want to hear any more," said the duck woman sharply, and she walked away to continue her chat with the Englands.

----

to be continued

(Author's note: I'm not trying to imply that all home-schooling parents, or all Christians, are "fanatics" like the Englands.)


	6. No Escape

Immediately upon leaving Dudley's house, Muffy hurried to Francine's apartment building to check up on Augusta. Her knock on the door was answered after about two minutes by a rabbit woman with disheveled blond hair, dressed in a turquoise blouse and slacks, reeking of alcohol. "Hi, Muffy," she said weakly. "It's been a while."

"What do you mean?" asked the monkey girl as she slid past Augusta into the dingy apartment. "I saw you last week."

"You know what I mean," said her friend, shaking her head as if fighting off a headache.

"No, I don't," said Muffy impatiently. "Unless you're really Augusta's double."

"Bingo," said the rabbit woman as she collapsed clumsily onto the couch. "The other me had to leave the planet on short notice, so I took over."

Muffy's tone became firm but sympathetic. "You look awful. Would you like to tell me what's wrong, or are you too drunk?"

Augusta sighed miserably. "I can't live like this anymore," she half-mumbled. "I'm stuck as a woman, I've lost my powers, and I've lost Rick. I have nothing. Nothing except for a dead-end real estate job."

"Lost your powers?" Muffy marveled. "Lost Rick? How?"

"The Kron took away my powers," Augusta explained. "They removed part of my brain. I let them. I thought it was for the best. I thought I could live without them. But after the operation was over, I didn't feel the same way about Rick as I did before."

"Oh, that's terrible," said Muffy, grasping her friend's hand.

"Now when I look at him, all I see is a guy with a tentacle for a nose," Augusta admitted. "Whatever it was that made me fall for him, I've lost it."

"There are plenty of good men out there," Muffy assured her. "Men who don't have tentacles for noses."

"I'm sure that's true," said Augusta, giving the girl a condescending pat on the head. "Only problem is, I'm not a good woman. I'm a lousy woman. I don't know how to function as a woman. My heart's not into it."

Muffy opened her mouth again, but Augusta cut her off. "I'm sure you have lots of ideas for making my life better, but let's face it—you're just a little girl."

Nothing wounded Muffy's pride more than being called "just a little girl".

"I'll show you, Duplicate Augusta Winslow," she said haughtily. "I'm going to march out of here, and I'm going to find a man for you."

"You go, girl," said Augusta with a silly grin.

As Muffy departed from the apartment building, her heart brimming with determination, she imagined the profits she might reap from establishing a matchmaking service for magically gender-switched individuals. _There must be more than two of them in the world_, she thought.

Flipping open her cell phone, she noticed that Beat had left a message. She logged into her voice mail—and received a terrible shock.

----

Blindfolded, bound hand and foot, her mouth sealed with duct tape, Fern lay helplessly in the back of a truck. From the sound of a man occasionally clearing his throat, she could tell that one of her captors was nearby. She tried to cry for help, to ask the man where she was being taken, but she could make no sound.

She remained in fearful darkness for about fifteen minutes, and then she felt a set of fingers idly unfastening the strap of her helmet. Off it came, and curious knuckles stroked her fluffy hair. "You sure you're a boy?" came a surprisingly soft male voice.

"Mmf mmf mmf," Fern mumbled—translation, "I'm a girl." She spent the rest of the journey fearing that the man might try to obtain more positive verification of her gender.

The truck came to a stop, and two pairs of strong hands ported her into a house, or building, or some other sort of structure. They descended a flight of stairs or two, and then she was laid on a soft surface. A hand yanked the blindfold from her head, revealing that she was on a couch in a dimly lit, plain-looking, windowless room. Standing over her were two men wearing ski masks and black clothing.

"You can scream now if you want," said the soft-voiced man. "But nobody will hear you."

"Except for us," said the other man in a rather squeaky voice. Their masks had no holes in the top, making it impossible to guess at their species by looking at their ears.

Soft Voice grasped one end of the duct tape with his muscular fingers and quickly ripped it off, taking fur and skin cells with it. Fern winced from the pain, but didn't cry out.

"Nothing to say?" said Squeaky Voice as his partner tossed the strip of tape into a nearby garbage can.

"I know you work for Mansch," said the poodle girl defiantly.

"We ask the questions here," said Soft Voice.

"That wasn't a question."

"But this is," said Squeaky Voice. "Why are you dressed up like a boy?"

"Is that a crime?" Fern snapped at the men.

"We ask the questions here," Soft Voice reiterated.

Squeaky Voice loosened the rope binding Fern's hands, and the girl rubbed the tender skin on her wrists. "You won't get away with this," she muttered.

"Believe it or not," said Squeaky Voice, "that's the first time I've heard that line."

"Buster alerted the whole neighborhood," said Fern confidently. "The police will be here any minute now."

"I can tell you've never been kidnapped before," said Soft Voice.

"What does Mansch want with me?" Fern demanded.

"We ask the questions here," replied Soft Voice. "And I don't know any Mansch."

Squeaky Voice shook his head. "Neither do I."

The masked men stood up, covering Fern in their shadows. "You can untie your feet on your own," said Soft Voice.

"We'll be back when we think you're hungry," added Squeaky Voice.

With that, the men walked through the heavy metal door leading out of the dimly lit room, and closed it after them. Fern's sensitive ears picked up the sound of a lock turning.

She set about freeing her legs, then tossed the rope aside and started to explore the room. The couch, a small table, and a wooden chair were the only furnishings. A door to one side led into what was apparently the bathroom. Other than the locked door, there were no exits.

No TV. No books. No toys. No parents. No escape.

Fern started to whimper. She found herself wishing Buster had been abducted as well, so she would at least have company.

----

Not one of Fern's friends slept easily that evening.

Mrs. Krantz tucked in Sue Ellen again, and gave her another peck on the forehead. "I won't let those nasty kidnappers get their hands on you," the moose woman vowed.

Once her teacher had left the room, Sue Ellen started to jot down another journal entry. "Dear Diary: Fern was kidnapped today. Buster escaped to tell us all about it. The police are still looking for her. I hope they find her. It would be terrible if Fern died, but not as terrible as it was when my parents died. Mrs. Krantz is being really protective. She's afraid the kidnappers will get me. Why should she care? She's my teacher, not my mom."

At the same time, Alan lay awake in his bed, thinking about Fern. "I've been so busy reading my science books, and finding new constellations, and growing quartz crystals, that I never thought much about having a girlfriend. But why Fern? Let me quantify the reasons. First, she's smart. Second, she likes me. Third, the other girls don't like me. And now that she's gone, and possibly dead, I'm starting to realize...maybe I like her, too. Oh, this is so corny. Why can't I sleep?"

Beat, in the meantime, wrestled with a dilemma of her own. "How will I ever be able to face Alberto again? Don't think about him, think about Fern! I should have guessed he was interested in me. But what about Fern? He must have thought I was thirteen, or even fourteen. Think about bloody Fern! I hope my mum never finds out about him..."

Arthur was still wide awake when a visitor entered his room in the middle of the night. "Can I sleep in your bed?" asked the bleary-eyed, anxious-sounding D.W.

"I can't even sleep in my bed," mumbled the aardvark boy, rolling over to make room. His little sister crept beneath the covers and lay still, but fifteen minutes later neither of them was asleep.

Two small children approached the foot of the bed where Dave and Jane Read were resting, or attempting to rest. "Mom, Dad, I can't sleep," Arthur whispered. "I'm worried about Fern."

"I'm worried about me," added D.W.

Mrs. Read didn't move, but only moaned pathetically.

"Worrying won't bring Fern back," said Mr. Read groggily.

"Mom, are you sick?" Arthur asked with concern.

"Go back to bed now," his father ordered.

The two kids returned to Arthur's bed, but found that they were even more worried than before. "I hope Mom and Dad don't get sick again," said D.W.

"Yeah," said Arthur. "They may get sick for a whole year, and then I'll have to take over Dad's catering, and you'll have to do Mom's accounting."

"I'm more prepared this time," D.W. boasted. "I can count to one hundred."

"Really?" Arthur marveled. "I don't believe you."

"I'll prove it," said D.W. "One, two, three..."

"...twenty-six, twenty-seven...twenty...eight..."

To Arthur's relief, the girl dozed off before she reached thirty.

"If it worked for her, it should work for me," he thought. "One, two, three..."

"...fifty-two, fifty-three, fifty-four..."

"...seven hundred and ninety-seven, seven hundred and ninety-eight..."

When he woke up to the sun's first beams, he couldn't remember if he had made it to one thousand or not. He managed to catch a few more winks before his father stuck his head in the door. "Arthur, D.W., time to get up."

As the kids dragged themselves to the first floor of the house, they noticed something out of place. Grandpa Dave was shuffling around on his walker as he normally did, Pal was sleeping in a corner, Kate was striving relentlessly to reach the cookie jar, and Mr. Read was preparing oatmeal. However, in place of their mother's usual greeting, they received one from a familiar old woman.

"Hi, Grandma Thora," said D.W., smiling.

"Good morning, D.W.," said the gray-haired lady warmly.

"Where's Mom?" asked Arthur.

"Your mother's not feeling well today," Grandma Thora explained. "It's just a temporary thing. She'll be better soon."

Once she had led the kids to the breakfast table, they started to propose wild theories between bites of oatmeal. "I think she worried so much about Fern that she made herself sick," said Arthur.

"Then Fern's mom must be a lot sicker," said D.W.

Grandma Thora gave Mr. Read a knowing look. "Have you told them yet, Dave?"

"You tell them, Thora."

The old lady smiled long and hard at her two grandchildren. Behind them Kate waddled about in a diaper, chanting, "Gramma Fora...Gramma Fora..."

"I guess with all the confusion of Grandpa Dave moving in, no one bothered to share the good news with you," said Thora. "Your mother is going to have another baby."

----

to be continued


	7. No Choice

Having made a list of all the girls she knew, Muffy proceeded to eliminate all those who had known Dudley when he was still Dolly—Francine, Fern, Mavis, Beat, and Prunella. "Too awkward," she told herself. Yet quite a few names remained, among them some very obvious choices.

She located Marina just before the start of first period on Thursday morning. "Hey, Marina," she hailed the blind rabbit girl. "There's this boy I want you to meet."

"A boy...?" said Marina hopefully.

"He's having a tough time, and he could really use a girlfriend," Muffy went on, trying to cram her spiel into one breath. "There's just one catch—he used to be a girl himself—but he's a very nice, very cool boy."

"Slow down, Muffy," said the rabbit girl firmly. "Back up a little."

"What part didn't you hear?" Muffy asked her. "He's a very nice, very cool boy? He could really use a girlfriend?"

"You said he used to be a girl," Marina noted. "How is that possible?"

"Magic," said Muffy matter-of-factly.

Marina groaned and started to walk away, tapping the floor with her cane. "Come on, Marina," Muffy urged her. "I know you believe in magic. You're the president of the Lakewood chapter of the Henry Skreever Fan Club."

The blind girl tried to shoot Muffy an incredulous look, but missed. "If you want him to have a girlfriend so badly," she suggested, "why can't you be his girlfriend?"

"Are you kidding?" said Muffy with disgust. "He used to be a girl."

After Arthur and D.W. had arrived at the school and gone their separate ways, Van rolled up alongside Arthur on his way to Mrs. Krantz' room. "Any news about Fern?" asked the duck boy.

"Nope," Arthur replied. "But my mom's having another baby."

Van suddenly went white as a sheet.

"What?" said Arthur.

"Sorry," said Van, apparently quite shaken. "For a minute I thought you said_my_ mom's having another baby."

Meanwhile, D.W. met up with the Tibble twins on the way to Mrs. Frensky's class. As was common that morning, the boys were talking about Fern's disappearance.

"I think she was abdicated by aliens," Tommy speculated.

"Abducted," Timmy corrected him.

"It wasn't aliens," D.W. chided the twins. "Buster saw the whole thing. Even he says it wasn't aliens."

"I'm scared," admitted Nadine, who had just joined the group. "What if we never see Fern again?"

"I'm scared too," D.W. confessed. "I was so scared last night, I slept in Arthur's bed."

"You slept with your brother?" Timmy marveled. "You must be a baby."

"I'm a little baby," said Tommy mockingly. "I sleep with my big brother because I'm afraid to sleep alone."

"Cut it out," D.W. grumbled. "If you had a big brother, you'd sleep with him whenever you're afraid."

"Our mom slept with a man last night," said Timmy.

"She must have been really scared," Tommy added.

As Vicita was hurrying to catch up with the other first-graders, she heard a girl's voice calling to her. Stopping, she saw a tall fifth-grader with rabbit ears, an aardvark nose, and a red dress, gazing intently at her.

"You're Alberto's little sister," said the tall girl.

"I'm Vicita Molina," answered the pint-sized Ecuadorian.

"I'm Beat Simon," the fifth-grader introduced herself. "I wonder if I could ask you a favor."

Startled, Vicita took a tiny step backwards. "Alberto told me all about you," she said nervously. "You pretended to be a teenager."

"I didn't..." Beat started to say, but the little girl fled in haste without bothering to listen.

----

Razor wire lined the top of the high stone wall surrounding the atrium of the Elwood City Juvenile Detention Center. On the ground far below, a mob had assembled to witness a fateful confrontation. Binky, Molly, and the kids who favored them stood on one end of the basketball, while the other end was occupied by the hulking monkey boy Brick and his friends. Everyone present wore drab lime-colored uniforms.

The combatants, Binky and Brick, stepped out from their respective crowds. "You broke Dudley's nose," Binky hurled his challenge. "Now I'm gonna break something of yours."

"And I'll break whatever he doesn't," Molly threatened.

"I'm gonna pound you till you can't tell up from down anymore," Brick bellowed.

Gritting his teeth and pushing down the fear in his stomach, Binky stepped into the arena, his fists clenched into hams. The other boy was his equal in size, possibly in strength as well. Would he win this one?

As the other inmates held their breaths and waited in silence for the first punch, a man wearing a cap and uniform appeared before them. They began to groan, knowing that the presence of the warden would dampen their hopes of witnessing a rousing fight.

"Message for Molly McDonald," shouted the warden, holding up a sealed envelope.

The rabbit girl took a step forward. "That's me."

The warden stood by motionlessly as Molly tore open the blank envelope with Binky looking over her shoulder. She gasped as she unfolded the enclosed papers and saw the signature at the bottom. "It's from Mansch!"

His own interest piqued, Brick walked up and took a position behind Molly's other shoulder. "This had better be really good," he said gruffly.

Molly's consternation grew as she read the letter aloud. "Dear Molly: I hope this letter finds you in good health. Please rest assured that the bitterness your father harbors against me is not mutual. Rest assured also that your charade is fooling no one. You and Binky did not steal the necklaces, and your insistence to the contrary only places a roadblock in the path of justice. The sooner you come forward with the truth, the sooner the true culprit will be found and punished. I am not trying to destroy your father. On another note, I found the enclosed article in this morning's Times. I know Fern Walters is a friend of yours. I hope no harm comes upon her, as that would be a tragedy for all of us. Sincerely, Raymond Mansch."

A newspaper clipping was included in the envelope. Molly recited the headline—MASKED MEN KIDNAP 10-YEAR-OLD GIRL.

"Omigosh, it's Fern," said Binky, looking at the photograph. Molly cursed bitterly and quietly.

They stared at the article, soaking in its grim meaning, as the surrounding inmates gave up hope of a fight and trickled away.

"I hope nothing bad happens to her too," said Binky solemnly.

"You doofus!" Molly snapped with fire in her eyes. "Don't you get it? Mansch kidnapped Fern! He's trying to force us to tell the truth about the diamonds!"

Binky became angrier than ever as Molly's accusation gelled in his mind.

"We have no choice now," said Molly with resignation. "We have to admit everything, or he'll kill Fern."

----

to be continued


	8. Who ya gonna call? BrainBusters!

During afternoon recess, Francine called all of Fern's friends together on the school lawn so they could lend support to each other. This being an eventful week, many of those present had other concerns on their minds.

"He's a really nice, really cool boy," Muffy related to Jenna. "True, he used to be a girl, but nobody's perfect."

"Whatever," said Jenna. "As long as he doesn't ask me to marry him."

"I don't understand why only four people can visit your sister at one time," Prunella said to Alan, who appeared more emotionally troubled than anyone else at the scene.

"Hey, what's eating you?" George asked the distraught boy.

"I'm just worried about Fern, that's all," Alan replied glumly.

"We're all worried about her," said George. "If you're more worried than the rest of us, then you must be in love with her."

"Shut up," Alan grunted.

Francine summoned the group to order. "Thanks for coming, everybody. I called you together because I know you're all friends of Fern, and some of you are having a tough time because of the kidnapping, and I thought we could help each other. After all, that's what friends do. Now, does anyone have something to say?"

Arthur spoke up. "My mom's having another baby."

"That's nice, Arthur," said Francine glibly.

Beat raised her hand. "There's a rumor going around that I pretended to be a..."

"Whoa, whoa," Francine interrupted. "Let's stick to the subject. There are so many subplots going on now, it's easy to get distracted."

"You're just jealous because you don't have a subplot," said Muffy facetiously.

"I have something to say," Alan volunteered.

Francine motioned for him to begin. "I know this sounds trite," said the boy, "but I didn't know how much I cared about Fern until she was taken away."

"Someone's in love," Sue Ellen joked, and the other kids chuckled.

"Silence, please," said Francine. "Fern would want it that way."

"I want to say something," Buster chimed in. "Compared to Fern, we all stink at detective work. But that doesn't mean we can't put our heads together and try to think of a way to help the investigation along."

"Buster's right," said Beat. "Count me in."

"And me," said Alan, his spirits rising.

"Maybe my sister Odette can help," Van suggested. "She has experience with being kidnapped. And she just became a teenager, so she knows everything."

"The first thing we'll do is visit Binky and Molly," said Buster. "Maybe they can tell us why Mansch would kidnap Fern."

"We need a name for ourselves," said Alan. "We can't use FernBusters."

"How about ManschBusters?" Buster suggested.

"Or BrainBusters," Beat threw out.

"I don't like that one," said Buster. "It's like I'm the only one on the team who isn't a brain."

"BrainBusters it is," Alan declared.

----

Thrilled at the opportunity to perform actual detective work, Beat rushed to her apartment after school and filled a plate with leftover crumpets. "I won't be here for dinner, Mum," she informed her mother, who was removing clothes from the dryer. "I'm going to the detention center with Alan and Buster."

"You're not going anywhere tonight," came her mother's firm voice.

From the laundry room emerged a stern-looking aardvark woman. Beat could tell she was in serious trouble, but had no clue as to the reason.

"I thought we agreed that you wouldn't get involved with boys," Mrs. Simon lectured her.

"Alan and Buster are just friends," Beat insisted.

"I'm not talking about them," her mother continued. "Mrs. Molina called me today. She said her son Alberto asked you for a date, under the impression that you were a teenager."

"A date?" repeated the astonished Beat. "No, Mum, you've got it all wrong."

"You lied to an older boy about your age," Mrs. Simon accused her.

"No, I didn't!" Beat shot back.

Her mother's voice rose in pitch. "This is very serious, Beatrice. In your condition, you can't afford to take chances with older boys. I hate to do this, but you're grounded for the rest of the week."

Beat opened her mouth, but found she could neither speak nor breathe.

----

When Arthur and D.W. returned home, they found their mother seated in front of the TV, looking slightly pallid. "Mom, you're better!" the kids exclaimed in unison as they cheerfully hopped into her lap.

"I feel fine now," said Mrs. Read to her overjoyed children. "Your father has a marvelous bedside manner."

"Which means I can dodge anything you throw at me," came her husband's voice from the kitchen.

"Where's Grandma Thora?" asked D.W.

"She went home," her mother answered.

From the guest bedroom floated the now-familiar sound of Grandpa Dave snoring.

"Kids, there's something I need to talk to you about," said Mrs. Read seriously. "With the new baby on the way, and your grandpa staying with us, it won't be long before this house isn't big enough for all of us."

"We can make the house bigger, can't we?" said Arthur.

"Yes, we can." Mrs. Read took a deep breath that sounded more like a sigh. "But as you know, a lot of people have been moving into Elwood City lately. Property values have gone up, and it may be more economical to buy a bigger house than expand the one we live in now."

"Oooh," gasped D.W. with delight. She imagined herself in a gigantic mansion, with gilded hallways running all the way to the horizon, and a room for her unicorn toys, and another for her troll dolls, and another for her Mary Moo Cow merchandise...

"But if we buy a bigger house," said Arthur, "won't we have to, like, move?"

His mother nodded.

"Where would we move to?"

"We can move almost anywhere, since your father's self-employed."

"I want to move to Mars," said D.W. excitedly.

"I want to stay here," said Arthur earnestly. "All my friends are here."

"You'll make new friends," Mrs. Read assured him.

As the prospect of leaving behind his home and friends troubled him, Arthur fantasized about the situations he might face.

He stood at the head of a classroom with crooked walls and cracked plaster, facing a batch of the strangest-looking kids he had ever seen. Next to him stood an wraithlike old woman in a black dress. "Children," she announced, "today a new student has chosen to join us in this doomed exercise in futility which we call a class."

"Uh-huh," mumbled the disinterested pupils.

"My name's Arthur Read," he began, anxiety pulling at his heart. "My family just moved into the big house on Carter Street. Every time my mom has a baby, we move into a bigger house. I've moved three times in the past five years."

As he returned to his desk, sinister murmurs caught his ear. "What a weird-looking kid." "How do his glasses stay on?" "I bet he never gleeped nothin'."

Once he had seated himself, a bespectacled rabbit boy at the other end of the room pointed at him and glowered fiercely. "He's an alien!" the boy ranted. "He's come to destroy us all!"

"You're crazy," muttered a curly-haired cat girl.

"Don't take it personally," a green-skinned kid with huge purple eyes said to Arthur. "He calls everybody an alien."

Similar fantasy scenarios played in his mind for the rest of the day. He couldn't imagine leaving behind the only neighborhood he had ever known. What perils would he face in another part of the world? Would the show move with him, or stay behind?

----

Determined to contribute in some way to the search for Fern, Alan and Buster met at the detention center with Odette, who had arrived with her mother.

"Be careful, dear," Mrs. Cooper cautioned her long-necked daughter. "Leave staking out criminals to the police. We don't want to lose you again."

"Mom, I'm thirteen," said Odette confidently. "Nothing can hurt me."

It was visiting time at the facility, and eager inmates Binky and Molly were seated on one side of the plexiglass barrier while Buster and Alan sat on the other. An impatient-looking police officer stood at duty nearby. "Here she comes," blurted out Buster when he saw Odette walking up. The girl had grown several inches over the summer, and now appeared to be taller than anything in the room, including the room.

Binky lit up when he saw her. "What's the swan doing here?" asked Molly peevishly.

"I'm not standing by while some poor girl goes through the same thing I did," was Odette's reply.

"I'm not seeing her anymore," Binky reassured Molly. "It's too hard on my neck."

"Sit down, Odette," said Alan.

"I am sitting down," was Odette's response.

Once she had the attention of the three visitors, Molly began her story. "I haven't told you the whole truth about the diamonds," she admitted. "I don't want my dad to go back to prison. I believe Mansch is trying to frame him, and he kidnapped Fern to ensure our cooperation. He sent us this message."

The rabbit girl slipped the letter and newspaper clipping she had received through the opening, and Buster read it to the others.

"It doesn't leave much doubt," Alan remarked. "He obviously went to the trouble of finding out that Fern was a friend of yours."

"At least she won't end up as some guy's third wife," said Odette.

"But she's in danger just the same," said Molly, who spoke with a tone of contempt for the swan girl. "I think I should tell the police what really happened. I don't want Fern to get hurt."

"Not so fast," Odette warned. "If you give Mansch what he wants, he'll have no more reason to keep Fern alive. You must wait until the police find her."

"You don't know who you're dealing with, neckosaurus," said Molly insultingly. "Mansch is an expert criminal. When he hides something, it stays hidden."

"Odette's right," said Alan. "Mansch is dangerous. We can't let him get away with what he's trying to do."

"If Fern were here," Buster mused, "she'd be analyzing the drug Mansch used on Mr. England's dogs."

"I'm sure the police have tried that," said Molly. "I'm sure they're doing all they can. This is a kidnapping, not some lame mystery where someone writes your name all over the school."

Armed with the message Mansch had sent to Molly and not much else, Buster and Alan departed from the detention center, debating their next move. Meanwhile, Odette squeezed herself into the family Buick, and talked with her mother as they drove away.

"I don't get it, Mom," the swan girl pondered. "Why does God allow these evil people to do so much harm, when he has the power to stop them?"

"In his eyes, we're all evil people," was her mother's reply. "For all have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God."

Unsatisfied, yet not knowing what else to say, Odette remained silent until she arrived at home.

In a razed spot in front of the Cooper house, Van was watching with interest as Dallin played marbles with a boy Odette had never seen before. "Who's the fuzzy kid?" she asked her mother.

"That's Zeke England," Mrs. Cooper answered.

Zeke, the pom boy, laid down his agate and raised his head to greet Odette. He raised it some more. "You sure have a long neck," he remarked.

"All the better to dance with," said the swan haughtily.

"Zeke lives in the house near where Fern was kidnapped," Mrs. Cooper explained. "His parents are fine Christian people. They thought it would be a good idea for their son to associate with a good Christian boy like Van."

"He's not very polite," Odette remarked.

"I guess he's never seen a swan person," said her mother. "He doesn't get out much. He's home-schooled."

Intrigued by the strange boy, Odette squatted down next to the marble arena. Zeke looked at her and glanced up and down, sizing up her neck.

"That's my sister Odette," Van told his new friend.

"She's a swan," Zeke pointed out. "The rest of you are ducks."

"I wasn't adopted," Odette informed the boy. "I came from the same mother."

"I understand," said Zeke flatly. "Has your mother repented of her sin?"

All at once, three beaks fell open in astonishment.

"It wasn't a sin," said Odette indignantly. "Sometimes people are just born differently."

"What are you talking about?" Dallin wondered.

"It's none of my business anyway," said Zeke as he rolled a marble around in his fingers.

----

to be continued


	9. Tegan's Debut

Soon after Mr. Krantz came home from his job as an upholsterer, Sue Ellen received a phone call from Carla Ratburn. The Costa Rican woman sounded as if she had to expend great effort to speak.

"Nigel and I are back from the hospital," she related, "but we're still a little under the weather. If it's no bother, we'd like you to stay with your teacher for a few more days."

Still holding the phone to her head, Sue Ellen sneaked a peek into the computer room, where Mr. Krantz was engrossed in a game of Virtual Goose VI: Eggs Calibur. "Uh, yeah, that'll be fine," she said with a bit of reluctance.

"We'll see you soon," said Carla, and the call ended.

Mrs. Krantz, who had listened in, was overjoyed at the news. "This is fantastic!" she gushed in her usual grating voice. "We'll have so much fun. Arnold and I are going diving on Saturday, and you can come along."

Sue Ellen's heart did a backflip. "I love diving! Where are we going? Acapulco? Maybe we'll find some pearls."

"No, we're just going to the beach," the moose woman told her.

"That's okay, I guess," said the cat girl disappointedly.

"We'll have a great time," Mrs. Krantz reassured her, and then she did something very un-teacherlike. She kissed Sue Ellen on the cheek.

On the forehead was bad enough, but on the cheek? It was wrong on so many levels.

She wandered into the computer room, wiping the saliva from her face. "Care for a two-player game, Sue?" Mr. Krantz invited her.

"No, thanks," she replied. "I'm trying to give it up."

----

"Omigosh," exclaimed Jenna when she beheld the bandaged state of Dudley's nose. "What happened to your face?"

"My nose is broken," the rat boy replied with a nasal twinge to his voice.

"A bigger kid picked a fight with him," Muffy explained.

"Gosh, that's horrible," Jenna remarked. "What happened to the kid?"

"I don't know," Dudley answered. "Binky and Molly said they'd get even, but..."

"Wait," Jenna stopped him. "Binky and Molly are in juvie."

"That's right, they are."

Jenna's tone became hushed. "That means you were in juvie too."

Dudley nodded.

"Let's go, Muffy," said Jenna, turning abruptly to leave.

"What's wrong?" asked Muffy as she followed the pointy-nosed cat girl to the front door of Dudley's house.

"You didn't tell me he was in juvie," Jenna complained.

"I wanted it to be a surprise," said Muffy with a grin. "Some girls think that's cool."

"Not me," said Jenna with finality.

The two girls exchanged few words as they rode together in the back seat of Muffy's car. As they neared the Crosswire condo, Muffy heard her cell phone ringing.

"Hello?"

"Muffy, this is Beat. Would you please assign someone else to my time slot for meeting Alan's sister tomorrow? I'm afraid I can't come."

"Oh? Why not?"

Muffy heard a moment of silence on the line.

"I'm grounded."

The surprise nearly short-circuited Muffy's brain.

"You?" she sputtered. "Grounded? You've never been grounded before. Not even when we had that fight last year. Whatever you did, it must have been a doozy."

"It was a doozy indeed," said Beat, "except I wasn't at fault. I met a teenage boy, and we had an interesting conversation, and the next time we met, he asked me for a date. Because I look older than I am, he mistook me for a girl his own age. My mum heard a rumor that I tried to pass myself off as a teenager, and she grounded me. I tried to explain to her that I never misrepresented myself, but her mind was made up."

Muffy sighed. "That's a tough break, Beat. Here's what I think happened. After the boy realized his mistake, he told his friends that you lied to him, because he didn't want to look stupid in front of them. You know how boys are, especially teenage boys."

More silence greeted Muffy's ear. "I think you're right," Beat's voice finally came through.

"Am I ever wrong?" Muffy boasted.

"I must find that boy, and make him tell the truth," said Beat with determination. "Thank you for the advice, Muffy."

----

She knew that if she wanted to meet Alan's sister with her friends, she had to set things right with Alberto and her mother the very next day. That meant sneaking out of school during lunch, and running the eight blocks to Hogarth High School.

When she reached the school, slightly winded from the jaunt, she began to wander the hallways in search of the Ecuadorian boy. The high school resembled Lakewood for the most part, except the lockers, and the students themselves, were considerably taller, and the water fountains stood higher from the floor.

She walked up to a pair of teenage rabbit girls, who seemed to pay no attention to her. "And then I was like, whatever," babbled one girl to the other. "And he was like, as if."

"Like, no way," was the other girl's well-phrased response.

"It's like, totally true," the first girl insisted.

"Pardon me, ladies," said Beat politely, "but I'm looking for Alberto Molina."

The rabbit girls shrugged and grinned vapidly. "You could, like, try the lunchroom," one of them suggested.

"You're, like, kinda short," remarked the other. "Are you, like, a new freshman?"

"Like, totally," said Beat sarcastically, and she quickly strolled away.

Signs on the walls led her to the cafeteria, which proved to be significantly larger than the one at Lakewood. She made her way through the crowd of at least a hundred adolescents, who apparently didn't find her presence strange at all, until she finally spotted a dark-complexioned boy with pointed ears. _That's him_, she thought.

Alberto was seated at a table with four other big boys, feasting on a plate of meat loaf and cracking jokes about teachers, when an unwelcome sight hit his eyes. "Ay caramba," he groaned. "You again."

The rabbit-aardvark girl approached him, her gaze fixed. "Why did you tell your friends that I lied about my age?" she demanded.

"Go away," said Alberto with a forbidding scowl.

"Because of you my mum grounded me," said Beat, her little-girl voice sticking out among the deep bass tones of the boys. "I insist that you call her and tell her what really happened."

The boys at Alberto's table stopped talking among themselves, and set their curious eyes on Beat. The Ecuadorian boy rose to his feet and glowered. "I told you to go away," he said menacingly.

"Not until you call my mum," said Beat unflinchingly.

"I'm eating my lunch," Alberto pointed out.

Anger welled up in Beat's stomach as she stared at the petulant boy.

Then, with one sweep of her arm, she shoved Alberto's meal tray off of the table. It crashed to the floor, scattering bits of meat loaf and gelatin on the boy's sneakers.

The entire cafeteria fell silent. Every pair of eyes turned toward Alberto, who glared in disbelief and outrage at the girl who had spoiled his lunch and his shoes.

It almost seemed to Beat as if she were watching herself from outside her body, astonished at her words and actions, yet unable to control them. "Enjoy your lunch," she heard herself saying.

"I'll kill you!" growled Alberto, lunging at the British girl. She effortlessly dodged his advance, then grabbed his arm and twisted it behind his back; it all seemed to happen in the blink of an eye.

Alberto grimaced as the muscles of his arm roared in pain. His friends looked on in wonder, amazed that such a diminutive girl had managed to subdue him.

"You have no idea who you're messing with, punk," Beat snarled into his ear. "Now do as the little lady says, or I'll grind you up and feed you to the locusts."

Too terrified to resist or reply, Alberto only whimpered. Beat tightened her steel grip on his arm.

"Let him go," ordered a male voice. Beat's fury-blinded eyes made out the image of a middle-aged, heavyset dog man with straggly red hair—obviously the principal.

As she calmed down and released Alberto from her hold, she realized that she could scarcely remember what she had just done. She vaguely recollected referring to herself in the third person, and speaking without a British accent...

----

Beat's attempt to defend herself before the high-school principal was unsuccessful, and she was sent back to Lakewood to face the wrath of Haney. Her mother was notified immediately, and she found herself in even hotter water than before.

Needless to say, she wasn't with Arthur, Francine, and George when they arrived at Alan's house to welcome his sister for her weekend stay. Buster, Prunella, Van, and the rabbit girl with the striped shirt who never spoke were on their way out.

"You won't believe how smart she is," Prunella remarked to Francine. "She makes Einstein look like a doofus."

"And she can play the violin like an angel," said Van, who held an instrument case in his lap.

The rabbit girl with the striped shirt smiled at Arthur, but had nothing to say.

Alan then introduced the newcomers to the 14-year-old Tegan Powers. The blond-haired girl looked quite a bit like her younger brother, but other than that seemed unremarkable, except for two features. A silver barette held her wavy hair in place, and appeared to be clamped to her ears and chin like a harness. Her knee-length skirt revealed a thick strip of gray fabric wrapped around her right leg. Arthur recognized it from a police show he had seen—it was an electronic monitor bracelet.

"Hi, my name's Tegan," said the girl. Her manner of speaking was slow and deliberate, as if she was unaccustomed to communicating vocally.

"I'm George," said the moose boy. "I like to build things. I just built a toy helicopter using a design by Leonardo da Vinci."

As George and Tegan launched into a discussion of Leonardo's life and works, Arthur led Alan aside. "Why does she have a monitor bracelet?" he asked quietly. "Is she under house arrest or something?"

"Not exactly," Alan replied. "Tegan's a bit absent-minded. Sometimes she wanders off and gets lost."

"Oh, I get it," said Arthur. "The bracelet lets you find her."

The last group to visit Tegan included Muffy and two of Alan's sixth-grade classmates. Once they had departed, Alan and his parents gathered around Tegan, who reached up and slid her barette to the back of her head. Her thoughts began to course into the minds of the other members of the Powers family, and their thoughts became audible in her mind. It was only the third time Alan had experienced the merging, and he still felt somewhat uneasy about being present in so many minds and bodies at once.

"I just love your friends, Alan," Tegan thought. "I really want to get to know them better."

"You will," Alan thought back. "But remember, you can't use your powers on anyone who doesn't know about them."

"Then I'll have to do it the old-fashioned way. By talking."

Tegan moved the barette back to the crown of her head, and the connection between minds faded and disappeared.

Then she turned to her brother. "You're worried about someone," she observed. "A girl. She's missing. She's in danger."

"Yes," Alan admitted sadly. "A friend of mine. She was kidnapped."

Her heart touched, Tegan lifted her hands to slide the barette again, but Alan motioned for her to stop. "Please don't," he urged. "It's embarrassing."

"Okay," said Tegan, dropping her hands.

His mind beset by worries once more, Alan shuffled to the front door and watched as his friends disappeared down the sidewalk. He glanced down at the wires and sensors that had been installed along the bottom of the wall. Sitting inside of his house, not permitted to leave, was a girl who held the key to finding and rescuing Fern. The scientists at Ballford had explained to him and his parents the complications that might arise if Tegan were allowed to freely exercise her mental abilities. "Society isn't ready for her," they had declared. "She isn't ready for society." Alan had never felt so powerful and powerless at the same time.

----

to be continued


	10. A Perfect Gentleman

"Hello?"

It was a voice she hadn't heard since spring, and she welcomed it—for the moment. "Hello, dear," said Mrs. Winslow, Augusta's mother. "You're not sitting at home alone on a Friday night again, are you?"

Same old Mom. "Let me check," said Augusta disinterestedly. Glancing at the calendar on the wall, she added, "Yes, it's a Friday. And nobody else is here as far as I can tell, so you're right."

Mrs. Winslow sighed bitterly. "You were a disappointment as a son, and now you're a disappointment as a daughter. Unless you get out of your apartment and meet someone, you'll never get married, and I'll never have grandchildren. Remember, now that you're a woman, you have a biological clock to worry about. Whatever happened to that nice psychiatrist you were seeing?"

As Augusta wondered how much of this nagging her duplicate had endured, she heard a ring at the door. "Just a minute, Mother," she said with relief. "Someone's at the door."

"Don't hang up on me, you..." Mrs. Winslow started to say, but Augusta had already flipped her cell phone closed.

Her visitor turned out to be no less a nuisance. "Good evening, Augusta," Muffy greeted her officiously. The monkey girl wore a white chiffon dress and sported a professional-looking hairdo. "All sobered up, I see," she remarked, sniffing the air.

"I'm ready, I guess," said Augusta, looking down at the beige floral dress she was wearing. "Where are we going?"

"The Elwood City Museum of Art," Muffy announced.

Augusta groaned. "I don't know the first thing about art. Who do you expect me to meet there?"

"A friend of mine," Muffy answered. "He used to work for my father, but now he's taken up sculpture."

Too apathetic to withstand the girl's insistence, Augusta locked up her apartment and led the girl to her car. "I still think you're wasting your time," she said along the way. "No one will ever replace Rick. He made me feel as if I'd been a woman all my life."

"Bailey is a perfect gentleman," Muffy assured her. "You'll love him."

That evening the art museum was hosting an exhibit entitled, 'CHESTER' AND OTHER KINETIC SCULPTURES BY CHARLES BAILEY. Muffy's former chauffer was presenting his works to a small but appreciative crowd. Gesturing toward a wire-frame structure with a tape recorder attached, he stated, "'Chester' is based on a boy who bullied me in fourth grade. The image is not so much of the boy himself, but of my perception of him filtered through many years of recollections."

Muffy and Augusta approached him just as he was concluding his tour with a demonstration of a wooden credenza which, with the turn of a crank, transformed into a many-legged spider. "Miss Muffy," he greeted his one-time charge. "What a pleasure to see you."

"Bailey, this is my friend Augusta Winslow," said Muffy. Augusta timidly put out her hand, and Bailey reached out to shake it.

"You're the lady about whom Miss Muffy has told me so much," Bailey observed. "A pleasure to meet you."

"Nice to meet you," said Augusta glibly.

"Have you had a chance to examine the other exhibits?" Bailey asked the rabbit woman.

"No, I haven't," Augusta replied. "Can you believe it? I've been living here all summer, and this is my first time at the art museum."

Bailey started to lead her through the rooms of the museum, showing off paintings by Renault, Vandermeer, and Mondriaan. "I have been a connoisseur of the visual arts since youth," he related.

Augusta stopped in front of a Mondriaan painting, which featured a number of colored rectangles. "This isn't art," she commented. "Anyone could paint this."

"Not anyone, madam," said the unruffled Bailey. "It requires years of practice and thought to make such a powerful statement using only simple shapes and primary colors."

"I still say it looks like a floor plan," Augusta insisted.

"Perhaps art is not one of your stronger points," said Bailey. "What about literature? I have been indulging of late in the works of the French masters—Hugo, Dumas, Rabelais..."

"I don't know if _Malleus Maleficarum_ counts as literature," said Augusta hopefully.

"I haven't heard of it," said Bailey curiously. "Is it a work of Roman antiquity?"

Seeing that the conversation was going nowhere in circles, Augusta decided to change the subject. "Do you like basketball?"

"I'm more of a cricket man," answered Bailey.

"I was quite a basketball player once," Augusta boasted.

"Odd," said Bailey, narrowing his eyes. "I've always felt that women are ill-suited for such a demanding sport."

Even Muffy, by this time, had come to the conclusion that Bailey and Augusta had nothing in common whatsoever.

Once Augusta had bid farewell to Bailey, Muffy started to propose more ideas. "Tomorrow night I'd like you to meet Mr. Wells. He's an interior decorator. Knows everything about feng shui. And maybe next week you can meet..."

"I'm sorry," Augusta interrupted her, "but I'm busy tomorrow night."

Muffy stared at her unbelievingly. "B-busy? Doing what?"

Augusta quickly thought of an excuse. "Maria and I are going to a club."

"A club? Oh, what fun! Chess club? Drama club?"

"Nightclub."

Muffy knew almost nothing of nightclubs—those crowded, flashy places where only people over the age of eighteen were allowed to enter. "Which one?" she asked stupidly.

"There's only one nightclub in Elwood City," Augusta replied. "And that's the Fifth Street Meat Market."

"No problem, then," said Muffy confidently. "I'll tell Mr. Wells to find you there."

Augusta stifled a groan. Muffy's earnestness both touched and annoyed her, and she didn't wish to hurt the girl's feelings. Come Saturday night, she would have to face either an offended little girl, or dozens, possibly hundreds, of single men gawking at her body...

----

The next morning, Beat Simon was as grounded as a lightning rod. Unable to leave her apartment, she lounged on the couch and watched nature documentaries on the small TV. Occasionally she talked to her mother, who was typing out a new fantasy novel on the computer, about her odd and inexcusable behavior of the previous day.

"There's something I haven't asked you about," said Mrs. Simon, looking away from the screen at her not-so-little daughter. "Many women get grumpy once a month because of something that happens in their bodies. Maybe that's what you were feeling when you attacked Alberto. Have you noticed any..."

Beat suddenly interrupted her biology lesson by screaming in terror.

On the TV screen, a large copperhead snake was slithering among the rocks and cactus in the Arizona desert.

"What is it?" asked Mrs. Simon in alarm.

Beat, her heart pounding like a drum, found that the fear had vanished as quickly as it had appeared. The snake was still sliding about, flicking its tongue, but she felt strangely ambivalent about it.

"The snake," she muttered in disbelief. "The snake on the telly frightened me."

"You've never been afraid of snakes before," Mrs. Simon observed.

"True," said Beat. "How very odd."

Unsettled by the weirdness of her feelings, Beat switched off the TV and retired to her bed. Lying on her stomach, she carefully pondered the events of the past two days. The most obvious explanation was that Andrew Putnam's memories and personality were resurfacing in her brain, after having been "erased" months ago. She had feared this might happen ever since discovering that she had advanced martial arts skills in spite of never having trained.

Yet that wouldn't explain the reaction to the televised snake. Andrew Putnam wasn't afraid of snakes—Mavis Cutler was. But why would Mavis copy her mind into Beat's? It made no sense at all.

_I must warn Frankie_, she thought, turning over and reaching for her cell phone.

Yet something stopped her.

She began to entertain wicked thoughts. "Maybe I should let it happen—let Mr. Putnam take over my brain. Let him deal with the craziness of growing up as a prematurely pubescent girl. He's more mature—surely he can handle it better than I can."

Then her better self took control. "Why am I thinking like this? Is Mr. Putnam influencing me? Is it already too late?"

Sitting up, she quickly and determinedly called Francine's number.

"You have reached the Frenskys. To leave a voice message, press 1 now, or wait for the tone."

Beat sighed with despair. She had forgotten it was Temple Saturday.

----

Moving to a new place, or staying with a new family, nearly always had the same effect on Sue Ellen—she caught a cold.

As she propelled herself through the Atlantic Ocean with plastic flippers on her feet, breathing with the help of a scuba mask and two small oxygen tanks strapped to her back, the pressure building up in her ears became harder and harder to bear. Soon she gave up, returned to shore, and trudged through the sand toward the wooden shack containing the washrooms.

No matter how much she shook her head or wiggled her cat ears, she felt as if someone had crammed conch shells into them—all she could hear was the roar of the ocean.

Resigned to wait until the pressure wore down naturally, Sue Ellen pulled off her cumbersome flippers and carried them with her across the sandy beach. Mr. and Mrs. Krantz sat on a wooden bench, eating hot dogs they had purchased from an adjacent snack bar. She would have called out to them, but she didn't feel like talking.

As she walked up to them from behind, her clogged ears picked out some of the words that Mrs. Krantz was speaking to her husband. She couldn't believe them.

"I've made up my mind. I want to abduct Sue Ellen."

"So do I," Mr. Krantz replied.

"Then we're agreed," said the moose woman.

Sue Ellen froze in terror. She had never imagined this in her worst fantasies. The Krantzes, who had treated her so kindly during the past week, were secretly plotting to kidnap her. Shocking scenarios raced through her brain. Were they also responsible for Fern's kidnapping? Were they in league with the enemy agent who had murdered her parents?

She knew she had to get away from them—to get help. Dropping the scuba flippers, she turned and ran as fast as her sand-warmed feet would take her. She was miles away from her neighborhood and her friends. Where would she find someone to protect her?

----

to be continued


	11. Evil Spirits

Seeing that Zeke had enjoyed his time with the Coopers on Thursday, the Englands chose to let him spend much of Saturday morning with the duck family. While Van, Zeke, and Dallin played Frisbee in the sun, Odette labored over a school project, while Logan lay on his bed, reading a teen magazine and listening to a new grunge rock CD. Mr. Cooper sat near Odette pondering some briefs, while Mrs. Cooper read a children's book to Megan in the kitchen.

Deciding that the front yard wasn't large enough for three-way Frisbee, Zeke strolled into the house to see if anything eventful was taking place. Seeing Odette in the study with her papers, he approached her and asked, "What are you working on?"

The swan girl looked up and smiled. "It's a report on the United Nations."

Zeke scowled slightly. "The United Nations is part of a plot to create a one-world government," he opinionated.

While Odette sighed with exasperation, Mr. Cooper raised his eyebrows in disapproval.

The sound of Logan's rock music caught the pom boy's ears, and he wandered over to the boy's room. "This music is evil," he told Logan unhesitatingly. "The devil uses it to spread unclean messages."

To say Logan wasn't pleased with Zeke's assessment of his music would be an understatement. The incensed duck boy tossed his magazine aside and marched out of his room to confront his parents. "Mom, Dad," he groused, looking at each of them in turn, "who invited this dork?" The music pouring from his room was suddenly silenced as Zeke hit the power button on his stereo.

"Be nice, Logan," Mrs. Cooper chided him. "Zeke isn't a dork."

"Yeah, he is," Logan insisted. "He said my music's of the devil."

"Well, maybe it is," was his mother's comeback.

"You're always saying stuff like that, Mom," Logan complained.

By this time Mr. Cooper had stepped into the living room, the argument having attracted his attention.

"Did you know that when you play 'Another One Bites the Dust' backwards, it says, 'start to smoke marijuana'?" Zeke related to the apparently sympathetic Mrs. Cooper.

"Dude, I've never seen a kid with two butts before," Logan mocked the pom boy.

"That's enough, Logan," said Mrs. Cooper firmly.

Then Mr. Cooper cleared his throat. It was an unmistakable signal that the debate was over, and his would be the last word. Everyone fell silent.

"Ezekiel," said the duck man calmly, "if you don't like hearing my son's music, you're welcome to call your parents and go home."

While Zeke stared at him in shock, Logan pumped his fists triumphantly. "Yes! Dad rules!"

Indignant at her husband's statement, Mrs. Cooper laid down the children's book and jumped to her feet. "You owe the boy an apology, Mel," she demanded. "If he doesn't want to listen to Logan's wicked music, he shouldn't have to."

"I've said it before and I'll say it again, Valerie," said her husband icily. "Music isn't good or evil. It's just sound."

"Except for cop-killer rap," Logan added. "That's evil."

Then Mrs. Cooper began to recount a tale. "Logan, did I ever tell you about the girl who started cutting herself while listening to heavy metal music?"

"Don't think so," replied the sloppily-dressed duck boy.

"She had to be taken to the hospital," his mother went on. "She was speaking in a weird language. I think she was possessed."

When he had heard this, the steely-faced Mr. Cooper motioned for his wife to follow him. Everyone watched in stupefied silence as the couple disappeared into their bedroom. It could mean only one thing—an argument was brewing.

"For years you've filled the children's heads with nonsense about evil spirits," said Mr. Cooper scaldingly. "And for years I've put up with it, thinking there was no harm in it. But now that I see what such superstitions can do to a boy like Zeke, I have no choice but to put my foot down."

Mrs. Cooper gaped in astonishment and outrage, as if her husband were trying to shove her off the face of the Earth. "Jesus cast out evil spirits," she said slowly and fervently. "The Bible says so. If you don't believe in evil spirits, you don't believe in the Bible."

"Would it please you to know that Reverend Fulsome doesn't believe in evil spirits?" said her husband with an air of assured victory.

"You're lying!" Mrs. Cooper retorted.

"If you don't believe me, call him right now."

Logan, Zeke, and Odette still hadn't budged when Mrs. Cooper emerged from the bedroom and marched determinedly toward the phone.

The reverend, dressed for hot weather, was humming 'Rock of Ages' while mowing his lawn. Hearing a ring from his cell phone, the rabbit man shut off the mower and took the call. "Oh, hello, Valerie. What can I do for you?"

The duck woman's question was direct and to the point. "My husband claims you don't believe in evil spirits. Tell me it isn't true."

The reverend took a deep, thoughtful breath. "I wish I could. Other than a rather embarrassing experience at the Tibble house last year, I've seen little to convince me that demons exist. I've come to believe that the Biblical stories of Jesus casting out evil spirits are more allegorical than real. It was common during New Testament times to believe that evil spirits were the cause of everything from leprosy to..."

The shock was too much for Mrs. Cooper to bear, and she slammed down the receiver before Reverend Fulsome could complete his lecture.

By this time her husband had walked up behind her, the tip of his beak level with her shoulder. "Well?"

Fighting back the disgust and disbelief that filled her heart, Mrs. Cooper glared at her husband, then made a passing glance at Logan and Odette.

"Tomorrow," she announced calmly but emotionally, "we go to a different parish."

----

The Krantzes needed less than an hour to locate Sue Ellen, still dressed in her scuba gear, at a police station near the beach. She cowered behind one of the officers when she saw the moose couple approach.

"Don't let them get me!" she pleaded tearfully. "They want to kidnap me!"

"What gave you that idea?" asked Mrs. Krantz. She took a slow step forward, but Sue Ellen only gripped the officer's pants more tightly.

"Poor girl's been out in the sun too long," Mr. Krantz remarked.

"I heard you!" Sue Ellen spat at him. "You said you wanted to abduct me!"

Mrs. Krantz let out a high-pitched giggle. "That's not what we said, dear."

"Then what did you say?" asked the fearful cat girl.

Mrs. Krantz bent over and looked her directly in the eye.

"We want to adopt you."

Sue Ellen screamed in stark terror. "Don't let them get me!" she begged the officer.

Powerless to resist, the frantic girl was carted away by the affectionate Krantzes.

"That's the funniest thing I ever heard," Mr. Krantz chuckled. "You didn't hear us right because of the pressure in your ears, so you thought we were gonna kidnap you."

In the back seat of the convertible, Mrs. Krantz was vainly attempting to fasten a seat belt around the waist of the squirming Sue Ellen.

"You can't adopt me!" she protested loudly. "You're my teacher!"

"But I love you so much," gushed the moose woman.

The entire neighborhood heard Sue Ellen's rants as the Krantzes dragged her, scuba tanks and all, through the door of their house. "I won't let you adopt me! I won't let you..."

Once inside, she threw herself on the couch and wept bitterly. The Krantzes looked at each other, as if wondering whether a continued display of affection was the solution.

Then Mrs. Krantz reached out and dried Sue Ellen's tears with her fingers. "Okay," she said sweetly. "You win. We won't adopt you."

The images of cat girls with curly hair and antlers began to fade from Sue Ellen's frenzied mind. Her fear subsided. She sat up, sniffled, and rubbed her nose.

"What's for lunch?" she asked in a quivering voice.

----

The Saturday that had started sunny ended with cool temperatures. At the Powers residence, Alan celebrated the evening by playing his first game of chess against his long-lost sister, Tegan.

The teenage girl sat at one end of the coffee table, the silver barette still fastened over her crown. "Chess is a lot more interesting when I play with the blocker," she told Alan.

"The blocker?" Alan repeated. "You mean the thing on your head?"

"Yes," replied Tegan as she quickly made her first move. "It emits an electromagnetic pulse at the same frequency as my brain waves. As long as I wear it on the top of my head, it stops merging from taking place. Without it, I'd have no choice but to merge with everyone around me."

"I wonder what it's like," Alan mused.

"I can get to know a person very quickly by merging," Tegan related. "I can look directly at their feelings and memories. I can't do that by talking."

Sensing a subtle hint that his sister was tired of vocalizing, Alan played against her in silence. "Checkmate," she declared after what seemed like only a few minutes.

"I can't believe you beat me so easily," Alan marveled. "Were you reading my mind?"

"Nope," Tegan answered with a friendly grin. "I can't read your mind without you knowing it."

They played another game, in which Tegan handily defeated Alan yet again.

It was soon bedtime for the kids in the neighborhood. Mrs. Krantz tucked in Sue Ellen, but didn't kiss her. Tegan stayed up an hour after Alan had retired, then laid herself down in the guest bedroom. Her silver barette remained affixed to her head as she rested.

But she didn't sleep. At one a.m. in the morning, a shadowy figure carefully and noiselessly opened the door to Alan's room. Tegan, dressed only in her gray nightgown, crept to her brother's bedside as he snored obliviously.

Her head was only a foot away from his when she lowered her barette. The two siblings became one mind, part sleeping, part waking. His dreams became her dreams, and she knew exactly what she wanted to see in them.

"Dream about Fern..."

----

to be continued


	12. Losing Her Mind

After a night of fitful slumber, Sue Ellen arose, bathed, ate breakfast, and started to pack her belongings into her trunk. She could finally breathe easily, free from the fear of being adopted or abducted by the Krantzes, for Carla and Nigel were coming to reclaim her.

The Ratburns looked somewhat pallid and weak, but their reunion with their young charge helped to revive their spirits. "I missed you so much," Sue Ellen gushed. "I'm glad you're okay."

"From now on we'll be more careful when we go to sushi restaurants," said Mr. Ratburn jokingly.

"The next time you get sick," the cat girl requested, "can I get sick with you?"

"Of course you can," Carla replied. "Then the three of us can have a party in the hospital."

Before picking up her trunk, Sue Ellen turned to take one more look at the Krantzes, who appeared quite dejected that she was leaving them. "I'll see you again, won't I?" said Mrs. Krantz longingly.

"Well, duh," was Sue Ellen's response. "You're my teacher."

Soon she and her trunk were on the road with the Ratburns, as Carla kept her company in the back seat. She sighed with relief as the home of the Krantzes faded from her view. "I'm so glad to get away from that place. They wanted to adopt me, you know."

"Maybe that wouldn't be a bad idea," said Carla in a slightly raspy voice.

"It's a terrible idea," Sue Ellen protested. "My teacher can't be my mom. I'd get tired of looking at her all day."

"I used to be your teacher," Mr. Ratburn reminded her. "You don't seem to have a problem with that."

"You're not trying to adopt me," Sue Ellen responded.

They reached the Ratburn residence before long, and Sue Ellen had just started to unpack her clothes when Carla summoned her to the living room. She sat down before her guardians, who had serious looks on their faces.

"As much as we'd like to," Mr. Ratburn began, "we can't let you stay with us forever."

"But you said you would never abandon me," Sue Ellen pointed out.

"And we won't," said the rat man. "But Carla and I don't have the time or means to care for you like parents would. You need to start thinking about who you want your new parents to be, before the choice is made for you."

"I wish Francine's parents would adopt me," said the girl sadly. "But they don't want to."

"And there's another problem," said Carla. "An FBI director from Los Cactos tried to call us while we were in the hospital. April is coming back."

Sue Ellen's eyes went wide with joy at the news.

"She's been released on her own recognizance," Carla went on. "She'll arrive here on Wednesday."

"She'll need a place to stay," said Mr. Ratburn. "Her only friends are Augusta Winslow, the Coopers, and us. Augusta's been drinking, the Coopers already have five children at home, and we don't have room for both you and her."

"That's the trouble with time travel," Carla remarked. "People appear out of thin air, and then someone has to take care of them."

Sue Ellen racked her brain, but no solution was evident that would allow her and April to stay together. At least no palatable solution...

----

After an acrimonious dispute, the Coopers agreed to split up for their Sunday meetings. Mr. Cooper walked the nine blocks to Reverend Fulsome's parish with Odette and Logan, while his wife drove to another meetinghouse with Van, Dallin, and Megan. To Mr. Cooper's extreme displeasure, this was the same chapel where the Englands attended worship services. He would have been even more put out if he had seen Mrs. Cooper and her children seated on the same pew as the Englands.

"All things are possible through faith," preached Reverend Poundstone, an old aardvark man with a strong voice and piercing gray eyes. "If you have faith as a grain of mustard seed, you can move mountains. And if you can move mountains, imagine what you can do to your day-to-day problems."

When the service was over, the reverend greeted the new half-family that had joined his flock. "I've been going to Reverend Fulsome's parish for the past seven years," Mrs. Cooper told him. "Not once have I heard him deliver a sermon as inspiring as yours."

Poundstone nodded knowingly. "I've been watching him. He's one of the new crop—fresh out of divinity school, full of liberal ideas."

Turning to the three duck children who accompanied Mrs. Cooper, he asked Van, "How long have you been in that wheelchair?"

"Three years, sir," was the boy's reply.

"And how much longer will you be in it?"

"The rest of my life, sir."

"Hmm," said the reverend with an air of superiority. "Someone wasn't listening."

----

Once her own church meeting had ended, Muffy hurried to the Westboro apartment building, eager to lend more assistance to her friend Augusta. What she saw took her by surprise. In the tennis court behind the complex, Augusta, clad in shorts, sneakers, an athletic shirt, and a sweatband, was playing a lively game against the similarly-attired Maria Harris. The rabbit woman appeared happy for a change, as opposed to dejected and drunken.

When Augusta saw Muffy approach, she lowered her racket and allowed the ball to sail past her. "Hi, Muffy," she greeted the girl warmly. "I want to thank you for all your help."

"Mr. Wells couldn't make it to the club last night," Muffy apologized. "But he said he could meet you on..."

"Before you try to set me up with your friend again," Augusta interrupted her, "let me tell you about the terrific time I had at the club."

Muffy felt impatient that Augusta was trying to take the conversation in another direction, but she fell silent out of politeness.

"I thought I wouldn't enjoy it," Augusta went on. "But I had so much fun."

"Once she learned the Macarena, she was the life of the party," Maria interjected.

"Weren't you afraid you'd run into a lot of creepy guys?" asked Muffy with concern.

"Yes, I was," answered Augusta, picking up the tennis ball to deliver another volley. "And there were some men who couldn't take their eyes off me. But how could I blame them? I couldn't stop staring at my body when it was still new."

"I really think you should meet Mr. Wells," Muffy insisted.

"Does he like dancing?" asked Augusta as she swatted vainly at the returning ball.

Muffy pursed her lips. "Well, now that you mention it, he is a bit of a stick in the mud."

"To be honest, I made up an excuse about going to the nightclub so I could avoid meeting him," Augusta admitted.

"But I managed to talk her into going through with it," Maria boasted.

"And I'm so glad I did," said Augusta cheerfully. "For the first time since Rick and I broke up, I enjoyed being female, and didn't feel awkward about it."

Muffy quickly changed her tune when she understood Augusta's meaning. "That's what I've been trying to tell you all along," she claimed. "You don't need a 'miracle boyfriend' to replace Rick. There are other ways to find happiness as a woman, but you can't expect them to fall from outer space."

"To think I needed a little girl to teach me that," said Augusta with veiled sarcasm.

Leaving Augusta and Maria to their tennis match, Muffy wandered along the street toward her condo, thinking about how she might apply what she had learned to Dudley's case.

----

"There was a show on the telly about Disneyland," Beat recounted. "I've never been there, but some of the attractions looked familiar, especially Tomorrowland and the Pirates of the Caribbean. And last night I had a strange dream where I went to Disneyland with my parents. I was on one of the train rides, and I leaned over the side, and my glasses fell off into the water. But I don't wear glasses."

"That's what happened to me," said Mavis in astonishment. "A park employee had to wade in and get my glasses back. It's a good thing they weren't broken."

In Beat's apartment, her parents and Francine were also gathered to hear her remarkable story. "And I had another dream," she went on. "I was in a battle, and I took out a nest of enemy soldiers. They were Asian soldiers. I think it was Korea. Mr. Putnam served in Korea."

"I wish I could help," said Mavis, "but I can't remember any of what happened with you and Mr. Putnam."

"It's a good thing you told us," Francine remarked. "Now if I wake up in someone else's body again, I'll know who to blame."

Beat shook her head in confusion. "What I don't understand is, why would I have Mavis in my head as well as Mr. Putnam?"

"Here's an idea," Mavis proposed. "After Mr. Putnam was erased from your brain the first time, he was copied back without your knowledge. But I was the only one who had him inside of me, so I was copied as well."

"Very clever," Beat mused. "Putnam was about to destroy himself forever by deleting himself from your brain, but first he arranged to somehow put himself back in my brain, in such a manner that he would resurface after a number of months had gone by."

"Why can't he just die like the rest of us?" Francine wondered.

"We need to find the people who worked for Putnam before he died," Mr. Simon recommended. "Maybe they know a way to stop the process."

"But the Putnam mansion has been closed down," his wife pointed out. "Nobody knows where they've gone."

"Whatever we do, we must do it quickly," said Beat. "I fear it may be only a matter of days before Putnam takes over for good."

After Mavis had departed, Francine joined Beat in the disconsolate rabbit-aardvark girl's bedroom. "Whatever happens, I'm at your side," she assured her friend.

"I'm not sure if that's wise," said Beat fearfully. "I may try to hurt you and Sue Ellen like I did before."

"But we already know Putnam's body-switching device doesn't work," Francine recalled.

"True," said Beat, "but who knows what else the old man was working on?"

----

Ever since learning of her parents' murder and her father's true profession, Sue Ellen had lost all desire for international travel. The world had become a dark and dangerous place, full of enemies who would kill her unless she killed them first. All she wanted was to make a home for herself in a safe place, surrounded by understanding and loving friends.

She never wanted to leave Elwood City, or her immediate neighborhood, again. Yet there was the thorny problem of who she would stay with, whose child she would become. She wished to the point of pain that she could live with Francine, but this option was denied her. However, if there was a chance she could be adopted into the same family as April—in essence, become her own sister—she couldn't let go of it.

She hated what she was doing, but she was determined to see it through. A few seconds after she rang the doorbell, Mrs. Krantz stuck out her antlered head. "Hi there, Sue Ellen," she said in her usual syrupy tone. "I'm so happy to see you again. Come in."

The cat girl stepped inside rather hesitantly. Her teacher held out a plate of oven-warmed oatmeal raisin cookies, but she waved them aside. "I'm here to talk to you about adoption," she said flatly.

Mrs. Krantz gaped expectantly, hoping the girl had reconsidered her outraged objection.

"I'm willing to let you adopt me," Sue Ellen went on, "but on one condition."

----

The BrainBusters held a meeting at Alan's house that afternoon. Buster was the first to arrive, and was delighted to see Alan's sister again. "Hey, Tegan," he said to the girl with the silver barette.

"Hi, Buster," she replied as she stood. The 14-year-old's shoulders were roughly level with the tips of the rabbit boy's ears. "Have you learned anything new about Mansch?" she then asked.

"How'd you know about Mansch?" Buster inquired curiously. "Did Alan tell you about him?"

"Er, yes," interjected Alan, who shot an accusing glance at his older sister. "In a manner of speaking."

"I want to help you get Fern back," Tegan told Buster. "I care a lot about her."

"But you haven't met her," Buster pointed out.

"You could say we both share the same feelings for Fern," said Alan, who still appeared to be scolding Tegan for some secret transgression.

As Buster and Alan discussed their lack of progress on Fern's case, and Tegan offered helpful suggestions, Beat arrived and greeted the boys. "I just called Odette," she recounted. "She says she can't get a ride here because her parents are fighting."

"That's horrible," said Buster. "What are they..."

Before he could finish, Beat looked over at Tegan and the barette on her head, and an explosion went off in her brain.

"Good Lord, it can't be," she thought in astonishment. "A neuroblocker."

"Beat?" called Alan to the wide-eyed girl. "Is something wrong?"

"She's a Brainchild," Beat said to herself. "I never thought I'd actually meet one. No, wait...the girl knows one...his name's C.V."

"Beat, this is Houston," said Buster, waving his hand in front of the British girl's unexpressive face.

"What's she doing here?" Beat wondered silently. "Is it safe for her to be here?"

A moment later she was shaken from her reverie by the concerned voices of Alan and Buster. "Huh?" she grunted, shaking her head.

"Are you okay?" Buster asked her. "You zoned out."

Beat rubbed her forehead weakly as she tried to make sense of her epiphany. Somehow she knew that there were Brainchildren in the world—youngsters with unnatural mental abilities. Tegan and C.V. were among their number. Putnam had invented the neuroblocker as a means of preventing the Brainchildren from using their powers in harmful ways, but he had never encountered one personally, as their identities were shrouded in the utmost secrecy. Now Beat had become acquainted with not just one, but two, and her mind was filling with strange and terrifying feelings. What seemed like stunned silence to Buster and Alan was really Beat's struggle to regain control of her runaway thoughts.

She finally peered at Alan and spoke. "Keep her secret. Keep her safe. Don't let anyone near her...especially me."

Having said that, she turned and marched out the front door.

----

to be continued


	13. Three's a Crowd

When Beat Simon woke up the next morning, she was no longer alone in her brain.

She behaved normally, other than being strangely silent, up until she was seated at the dining table with her parents. As Mrs. Simon laid a plate of poached eggs in front of her, she announced simply, "Mum, Dad...it's happened."

"What's happened, dear?" asked her mother.

"Not everything has come back yet," said Beat with an eerie lack of accent, "but Mr. Putnam is now the dominant personality. That's only because he's older, of course."

Her parents stared at her with uncertainty and suspicion. "Can't you erase yourself like you did before?" asked Mrs. Simon.

"You don't understand," Beat explained. "She wants it this way. At first she was against the idea of a man transplanting his memories into the brain of a child, but after giving it some thought, she decided it would be an awful waste to let me vanish forever. So she asked Mavis to put me back in her brain. She knew exactly what she was doing, and acted of her own accord."

"Then why did you wait until now to come back?" asked Mr. Simon.

"I decided to use the opportunity to use an untested feature of the Opticron," Beat answered. "A feature that suppresses memories for a specific amount of time. Mavis copied everything from her brain into Beatrice's, then suppressed the new contents, as well as Beatrice's memory of having undergone the procedure."

"I think this is just wrong," Mrs. Simon protested.

"You're entitled to your opinion," said Beat coldly. "I happen to think death is wrong."

"How should we treat you, then?" Mr. Simon wondered.

"Like you always have," Beat replied. "I'm still your little girl."

----

No one noticed anything amiss about Beat as she walked past them in the hallways of Lakewood Elementary, except possibly the fact that she smiled more. She dressed the same as always, and had the same slight skip in her gait.

As she was on her way to Mrs. Krantz' room, Alan caught her eye and motioned for her to join him in a quiet corner. Once they were alone, he asked, "What did you mean yesterday when you told me to not let anyone near Tegan, especially you?"

Beat's expression became serious, betraying an intelligence far beyond her years. "I know what she is, Alan. I know what the device on her head is. The only thing I don't know is, what sort of powers does she have?"

"Powers?" said Alan, feigning ignorance. "She doesn't have any powers. Her last name is Powers, but that's it."

Beat reached up and stroked the chin of the boy who measured a full four inches shorter. "You can't keep the truth from me forever," she said with an affectionate smirk.

As the girl skipped away, Alan resolved that he would, indeed, protect Tegan from her.

When Mrs. Krantz read the roll, she included Sue Ellen's name. All were present except for, of course, Binky and Fern. Over the course of the first period, Beat astounded the class by giving answers even more bewilderingly brilliant than her usual offerings. This, naturally, made Francine very suspicious.

Wanting more than a few minutes alone with the girl, Francine waited until morning recess to confront her. "Who are you really?" she demanded to know. They were standing among the trees at the edge of the school property.

"I'm Beat," the British girl answered. "And Mavis. And Putnam. It's quite crowded in here."

"I'm not sure what to do," said the amazed and indignant Francine. "I could ask you to get out of Beat's mind, but you did that once already, and it was a trick."

"You have two people in your brain," said Beat flippantly. "Why can't I have three?"

Francine could only shake her head in despair.

"I hope things will be the same between us, Frankie," said Beat in her usual girlish tone. "I promise I won't try to switch you with anyone—unless you want to be switched, of course."

"No, thanks," Francine said firmly, and stormed away.

For the most part, the kids warmed up quickly to the new, improved, happier, smarter Beat Simon. There were still those who pointed and laughed at her early-blooming body, but she shrugged them off without a second thought.

During the lunch break, she and Muffy caught each other alone in the girls' room. "I noticed you're a lot less gloomy today," Muffy remarked. "What did you do, take sunshine pills?"

Beat didn't bother to reply to the small talk. "I understand you're trying to find a girlfriend for Dudley Green," she said seriously.

"Yes, I am," said Muffy. "But your mom won't let you have a boyfriend. Do you have someone else in mind?"

"You can't solve everyone's problems by matchmaking, Muffy," Beat informed her.

"Yeah, I learned that with Augusta," Muffy mused.

"I have another idea," said Beat, stepping closer to Muffy and speaking quietly. "Dudley isn't sad because he doesn't have a girlfriend. He's sad because he isn't a girl. The solution is obvious."

Muffy shrugged. "I don't know how to turn him back into a girl."

"Can you keep a secret?"

"Of course."

Beat narrowed her eyes and lowered her voice further. "Remember last February, when Sue Ellen and Francine switched bodies?"

"Yeah," said Muffy. "That was a cool joke."

"It wasn't a joke," Beat told her. "I did it."

Muffy replied with a confused glare.

"I have access to a device that can temporarily exchange the contents of two human brains," Beat confided. "I used it to switch Sue Ellen and Francine, and I intend to use it to switch Dudley with a girl."

"That's crazy talk," Muffy chided her.

Beat ignored the comment. "You know the girls better than anyone else, Muffy. If you can't point me to a girl who would like to experience being a boy for a few days, I'll do it myself."

"Good luck," said Muffy sharply.

Seeing she would get nowhere with Muffy, Beat exited the girls' room and looked around for someone else to talk to. Not far away Van was seated in his wheelchair next to a row of lockers, reading from a small leatherbound Bible.

"Hello, Van," said Beat as she approached the duck boy.

"Hi, Beat."

The rabbit-aardvark girl cut to the chase. "How would you like to walk again?"

"I will," Van replied simply.

"No, Van," Beat reiterated. "How would you like to walk again...now?"

"I will," Van repeated.

Mystified by the boy's answer, Beat left him and walked away.

----

At the end of the school day, Van waited at the curb for the family Buick to pull up as he always did. It arrived a few minutes late on this occasion, and Mrs. Cooper was the only one inside. As she helped him into his seat, she asked, "How are you feeling?"

"Hungry," the boy replied.

"Try not to think about the hunger," his mother advised him.

She drove him away from the school, but not in the direction of their home.

Once Beat returned to her apartment, she requested to be driven to Dudley's house. Her parents, curious as to their mind-altered daughter's interests, obliged her.

Most of the bandages had been removed from Dudley's nose, leaving a metal brace and a few scars. The rat boy was sulking in front of the TV when a familiar rabbit-aardvark girl arrived. "Hi, Beat," he greeted her. "You've grown a lot."

"It's nice to see you, Dudley," was Beat's warm reply.

They retired to the bedroom, where Beat took advantage of the privacy to make her proposal. "I have a way to make you a girl again."

Dudley's jaw dropped. "H-how?" he stammered. "Magic?"

"Technology."

The boy grinned hopefully as he imagined himself being pulled into a computer screen, digitized, reprogrammed, and pushed out as Dolly, the girl he once was.

"There's a catch," said Beat. "I can only make you a girl for a few days at a time. Also, you won't be the same girl you were before. You'll be a different girl. You'll be me."

"How is that possible?" asked Dudley as he looked up and down Beat's body, wondering how he would feel with such an appearance.

"It's a device that puts my mind in your body, and your mind in my body."

"But then you would be a boy," Dudley pointed out.

"I don't mind," said Beat flippantly.

"Are you sure you don't?" Dudley asked her. "Being a boy is a very sad existence."

"Like I said, it's only for a few days at a time."

Dudley gave the matter some thought, then said, "I'll try it."

"Good," said Beat with elation. "I'll come back tomorrow after school."

----

When Mr. Cooper returned to his house after a busy day at the law office, he found Logan in his room and Odette watching Dallin and Megan, but there was no sign of Van or his wife. "Where are Van and your mother?" he asked Odette.

The swan girl shrugged. "They dropped us off and went somewhere, I don't know where."

Figuring they had been called on an unscheduled errand, Mr. Cooper poured himself a drink of milk, sat down at the dining table, and flipped open a book of Super Challenging Crossword Puzzles.

"Hmm," he pondered. "Five-letter word for avarice..."

As he strained his mental faculties, Odette answered an incoming phone call. "Dad, it's for you."

The duck man tore himself away from the puzzle and answered the phone. "Hello?"

"Mr. Cooper, your son Van is in the hospital. He has a broken beak."

----

to be continued


	14. Splitting Ducks

His pulse racing, Mr. Cooper packed Odette, Logan, Dallin, and Megan into the other car, and rushed to the hospital at top legal speed. They found Van in room 221, lying on his back in a medical robe with a plaster cast coating his upper beak. Mrs. Cooper stood at the side of her son's bed, while a doctor dispassionately watched from nearby.

"Omigosh, Van!" exclaimed Odette, who held Megan in her arms. "Does it hurt?"

"Mm-hmm," mumbled the injured duck boy without moving.

"Don't try to speak," the doctor advised him.

The kids thronged about their bedridden brother, forcing Mrs. Cooper to step backwards. "How did this happen?" her husband asked, but she appeared too nervous and ashamed to answer.

"Dude, you smiled too hard again," Logan joked, and Van suppressed a chuckle.

"How did it happen?" Mr. Cooper demanded of his wife. "How did he break his beak?"

She spoke in a low, quivering voice. "He fell."

"Fell?" Mr. Cooper repeated. "From what? His chair?"

The duck woman looked away and remained silent.

"Answer me!" her husband ordered.

"The reverend," Mrs. Cooper mumbled. "At the Englands' parish. He said all things were possible through faith. He said Van could walk again if he had faith."

Her husband's eyes flashed with outrage.

"We fasted and prayed all day," she went on.

"Fasted?" snapped Mr. Cooper. "What about his blood sugar?"

"We went to the Englands' house," she continued, ignoring the question. "The reverend was there. We all prayed that Van would walk."

"Then what happened?" Mr. Cooper's face was livid.

"Then Van pushed himself up, and tried to walk, but..."

All of the kids, as well as the doctor, watched in breathless terror as Mr. Cooper struggled to contain the rage building within him. They were certain that at any second he would explode, taking his wife with him.

Mrs. Cooper looked at the floor and started to cry as her husband's face blazed like a thousand suns.

He made no attempt to shield his children from his furious tirade. "You've gone too far this time, Valerie. You will have nothing more to do with those fanatics and their superstitions, do you understand?"

His wife silently wiped tears from her cheeks.

"DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!"

She nodded weakly.

Mr. Cooper waited until he had calmed down a bit, then continued to speak. "As soon as we leave here, I'm going to give Social Services a call. The Englands are obviously unfit to raise children. I intend to see to it that Zeke is removed from their custody and placed in a foster home."

"No!" exclaimed Mrs. Cooper in anguish.

"Objection overruled," said Mr. Cooper half-angrily, half-jokingly.

"I won't let you take Zeke away from his parents," said his wife with sudden defiance.

"How will you stop me?" he challenged her.

Mrs. Cooper trembled as she worked up the courage to say something she knew she would regret.

"I'll divorce you."

The word 'divorce' blared like a siren in the ears of the horrified Cooper children.

"If you take that boy away from his parents," Mrs. Cooper vowed, "I will divorce you, and I will take the children. I'm not bluffing, Mel."

If there was such a thing as an 'angry grin', it formed on Mr. Cooper's lips at this moment.

"You can divorce me if you want," he said condescendingly, "but you can forget about taking the children. I'm a successful lawyer. You're a woman who believes in evil spirits and faith healing. Who do you think will win custody?"

Ice seemed to encase Mrs. Cooper's heart as she glared relentlessly at her husband.

Turning to the doctor, Mr. Cooper spoke as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. "How soon will my son's beak be healed?" he asked calmly.

"You're looking at about four weeks," the doctor told him.

Ignoring his wife's scowl, Mr. Cooper reached over the bed and patted Van's feathery scalp. "Keep on swinging, slugger," he said supportively. He then walked over to the doorway of the hospital room, turned, and gazed upon his brood. "Children," he called to them.

Logan, Odette, and Dallin looked back and forth between their mother and father. Logan stepped forward to follow his father almost without hesitation. Odette dropped Megan into her mother's arms, then proceeded after Logan. As for Dallin, he ran to his mother and wrapped his arms around her leg.

"Dude, Mom's really blown it this time," remarked Logan as he accompanied Odette and his father through the hospital hallway.

"Do you really think she'll divorce you?" Odette asked her father.

"There's only one way to find out," said Mr. Cooper as he reached for his cell phone.

----

Too furious to face her husband, Mrs. Cooper spent the evening at a hotel with Dallin and Megan. Van remained at the hospital, his beak slowly mending, visited at times by friends from school who had heard of his misfortune.

The next day was a gloomy one in Mrs. Krantz' classroom. Fern was still kidnapped, Binky was still incarcerated, and Van had a cast on his upper beak that made it impossible for him to speak and be understood. The notes he wrote on the blackboard only added to the pall by describing the contention between his parents.

While time passed uneventfully at Lakewood, the Englands were about to receive some unwelcome guests. As part of her home-schooling duties, Mrs. England was coaching her son Zeke in his memorization activities.

"Now let's go through the Bill of Rights again, starting with the Second Amendment," she instructed the boy.

Zeke cleared his throat. "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be..."

His recitation was interrupted by the sound of dogs barking. "I'll see who's there," said Mr. England as he reached into his gun closet and pulled out a firearm.

At the front gate, the two Dobermans were loudly protesting the presence of two uniformed people, a man and a woman, with nametags identifying them as agents of Social Services. Mr. England peered warily at them as he walked closer, the shotgun dangling from his hand. "Who's there?" he called out.

Once the dogs had jumped aside and ceased their barking, the woman handed Mr. England a sealed envelope. "This is an order to appear in court for a child custody hearing," she informed him.

"Child custody?" Alarmed, Mr. England pointed the barrel of his gun at the two agents. "I knew it was coming to this."

"Put the gun down, Mr. England," said the male agent calmly.

"If you want my gun," the pom man warned, "you'll have to pry it from my cold, dead fingers."

"If you ignore this order, you will be arrested," the female agent cautioned him.

"Send all you've got," said Mr. England defiantly. "You're not laying a grubby finger on my children."

Fearing for their safety if they continued to agitate him, the two agents walked away from the gate. "Cowards," sneered Mr. England as he watched them climb into a car with government license plates.

----

Unlike his friends, Alan was in the habit of commencing homework instead of watching TV after returning from school. Engrossed in a simple but deceptively profound algebra problem, he barely registered when his mother called to him, "I'm going to pick up some groceries. I'll be back in half an hour."

He was alone in the house with Tegan, who sat in a corner of the living room, looking over a home furnishings catalog.

The doorbell rang.

Remembering that Tegan wasn't allowed to answer the door, Alan pushed his homework aside with a reluctant groan, and went to see who was calling. His sister raised her eyes from the magazine and smirked.

Alan opened the door.

Before him stood a short cat man with a goatee. His black hair was tied into a ponytail in the back. He wore an expensive-looking gray flannel suit. Alan had never seen the man before, but he had no trouble recognizing him from the descriptions of his friends.

Mansch.

"Good afternoon, young man," said the cat man in a gruff but polite voice. "Is there a Tegan Powers living here?"

Alan's heart pounded against his chest like a jackhammer. His worst enemy, the man who had kidnapped the girl he liked, was standing on the doorstep, inquiring after the sister he had just met and had sworn to protect. Surely his intentions were as black as hell itself. There was no escape, unless Tegan chose to use her mind powers in a defensive capacity.

Slowly, cautiously, he turned around and looked hopefully at his sister. The girl smiled at him and flicked her eyebrows. She didn't move from her chair. Why wasn't she worried?

Then it hit him.

"Tegan sent for him," he realized. "She wants to read his mind and find out where Fern is."

Time seemed to grind to a stop around Alan. He was faced with an impossible choice. If he allowed Tegan to scan Mansch's mind, she might discover a way to save Fern from a ghastly fate—but then he would have to face his parents' punishment, and untold other consequences, for defying the orders of the Ballford scientists. His other option was to tell Mansch to leave, and perhaps destroy all hope of rescuing Fern.

"Young man?" Mansch said again.

A battle raged within him, and ultimately his feelings for Fern triumphed over his fear of punishment. He gradually backed away from the door and motioned with his head for Tegan to greet the visitor.

The blond girl jumped to her feet and hurried to the door, nodding knowingly at Alan along the way. Once she was eye-to-eye with Mansch, she immediately raised her hands and slid her barette to the back of her head.

Far enough away to avoid Tegan's mind-merging influence, Alan watched in awe as the bear girl and the cat man stared at each other with blank expressions. The air seemed to quiver and rumble around the two.

Thirty seconds passed.

Tegan moved her barette to the top of her head and smiled pleasantly at Mansch, who seemed slightly bewildered. "I-I think I have the wrong house," he said meekly. "I'm sorry."

Once the cat man had walked out of sight, Alan confronted his sister. "How did you get him to come here?" he inquired.

"I called him and said I had a tip about the identity of the diamond thief," said Tegan in a carefree tone.

"You know I'll be in deep, deep crud if Mom and Dad find out what I just did," said Alan worriedly.

"I saw into your mind," Tegan told her brother. "I knew you wouldn't try to stop me."

Alan lowered his voice. "So...what did you find out?"

"He ordered Fern's kidnapping," Tegan began. "She was taken by a pair of petty thugs with no connection to him. He doesn't know where she is."

Alan sighed with disappointment.

"However, he intends to release her once Molly admits the truth about where she found the diamonds," Tegan continued. "Also, he knows where the other two necklaces are hidden."

"So we have enough information to save Fern and bust Mansch." Alan pounded his fist into his hand. "Excellent."

"Our course of action is obvious," said Tegan. "First we convince Molly to confess everything. Once Mansch sets Fern free, we go to the police with the location of the hidden necklaces."

"I'm on it," said Alan eagerly.

----

to be continued


	15. Out of Her Mind

On her way to Dudley's house, Beat stopped at the post office and retrieved a black bag from a safe deposit box.

Her parents, Roger and Penny Simon, socialized with Dudley's adoptive parents, Bob and Babette Green, in the living room as Beat visited Dudley in his bedroom.

"We'd better make sure there's no hanky-panky going on," said Mrs. Simon as she sipped a cup of herbal tea. "Mrs. Green, would you please have a look?"

When Babette peered inside Dudley's room, she saw the rat boy and the rabbit-aardvark girl holding up a black device consisting of a wire with visors at each end and a control unit in the middle.

She returned to the living room to report. "They're just playing with toys."

"This device is called the Opticron," Beat explained to Dudley. "It transmits thought patterns through light waves. I put my visor over my eyes, and you put your visor over your eyes, and I push the button, and you see a series of colors, and before you know it, you're me, and I'm you."

"Incredible," said Dudley in amazement. "Let's see if it works, shall we?"

"By all means."

In a few seconds, both Beat and Dudley were sporting black visors on their faces, and Beat was clutching the control unit, preparing to activate the device.

"Keep your eyes open for five full seconds," she instructed Dudley. "Don't blink."

In the back of Beat's overcrowded mind, she heard the faint voices of two girls protesting what was about to happen to them. She ignored them and pushed the button.

A kaleidoscopic display of vibrant colors exploded before their eyes. The images changed rapidly, too rapidly for their conscious minds to follow. Dudley did his best not to blink. Several seconds passed.

The scintillating colors abruptly vanished. Dudley, sensing that the procedure was finished, reached up and plucked the visor from his face. To his shock, the first thing he saw was a red skirt that covered his legs in the place of his pants.

He looked down at his hands—the fingers were more slender, the shade of the skin lighter. He reached up to feel his head—shoulder-length hair tied by ribbons, and a pair of elongated ears. He cried out in delight—the voice had a girlish pitch.

Thrilled but frightened, he leaped down from the bed and rushed into the bathroom, feeling taller than normal. The mirror reported astonishing news—he was now the spitting image of Beat Simon, complete with rabbit ears, aardvark nose, red dress, long hair, and other female features.

"I'm a girl again!" she shrieked with joy.

Eager to tell the world of her good fortune, Beat/Dudley bounded out of the bathroom, waving her arms and squealing cheerfully. The next sight to greet her eyes, however, was not a happy one.

A terrified-looking rat boy with a metal brace on his nose was staring at her in disbelief. From Beat's perspective, she was looking at her own jubilant body through the rat boy's eyes. There was no Putnam or Mavis in her mind—she was alone.

Screaming like a banshee, the rat boy nearly knocked Beat/Dudley over in his rush to the bathroom mirror.

"Bloody hell, I'm a BOY!"

"I thought you didn't mind," said Beat/Dudley as she laid a hand on the dazed, disgusted rat boy's shoulder in hopes of comforting him. Dudley/Beat didn't say a word, or even breathe, but only stared incredulously at his boyish reflection.

Trying to be helpful, Beat/Dudley retrieved the black device from the floor, where it had been tossed carelessly. "I tried to warn you that being a boy is unpleasant," she scolded the petrified girl-turned-boy. "But you still have your device. You can change back whenever you so desire."

The sight of the device in Beat/Dudley's hands snapped Dudley/Beat from his trance. "The Opticron," he muttered hopefully. "I can use it to switch us back." He grabbed the device and started to turn it around in his hands. As he looked over the obscurely-marked controls, utter despair overwhelmed him.

"I DON'T KNOW HOW!"

"Don't be absurd," Beat/Dudley chided him. "You used it before."

"I-I don't understand," stammered the increasingly frantic Dudley/Beat. "Putnam's memories should have transferred with mine. I should know how to use the device, but I don't, and now...and now I'm stuck like this!"

The sound of Dudley/Beat's desperate tears attracted both sets of parents into the bedroom. "What happened, Dudley?" asked Mrs. Green. "Why are you crying?"

"I'm Dudley," Beat/Dudley filled her in. Pointing to the sorrowing rat boy, she added, "This is Beat."

"Oh, I see," said Mrs. Green playfully. "It's a game. Why are you crying, Beat?"

"Because I'm a boy!" Dudley/Beat wailed.

When Mr. Simon saw the Opticron device lying on the floor where Dudley/Beat had dropped it, he slapped his forehead in dismay. "Oh, Lord, they've switched bodies."

The combined efforts of the Simons and the Greens failed to console the miserable Dudley/Beat. While he sulked on the couch, Beat/Dudley pranced back and forth in front of the full-length mirror, admiring her beautiful new form.

"I don't remember why I wanted to switch with him," Dudley/Beat lamented. "Maybe Muffy put me up to it."

"I know I should be helping," said Beat/Dudley as she watched her skirt swing back and forth in the mirror, "but I'm so happy to be a girl again, I can't think of anything else."

"If it works the same way now that it worked when I switched Sue Ellen and Francine," Dudley/Beat said tearfully, "then in about a week, I'll have Dudley in my brain as well. Then I'll hate being a boy twice as much."

"It doesn't look very complicated," remarked Mr. Green as he scrutinized the Opticron's controls.

"If you push the wrong button, you can erase everything in your brain," Dudley/Beat cautioned him.

"How very ironic," said Beat/Dudley, gazing at her reflected visage. "This is the same face, the same mouth, that once threatened to burn me at the stake."

"This is a fine pickle," said Mr. Simon to the Greens. "We can't take our daughter home with us, because she's turned into your son."

Dudley/Beat gasped. "No! You can't leave me here!"

"It's only until we find a way to reverse the switch," Mrs. Simon reassured him.

"Dudley, you'll have to go with the Simons," Mrs. Green told the rabbit-aardvark girl. "Is that all right?"

"Yes, Mother," replied Beat/Dudley cheerfully.

"Mum! Dad!" Dudley/Beat pleaded. "Don't leave me!"

As Beat/Dudley followed the Simons toward the front door, she removed her cell phone from its clip and tossed it to Dudley/Beat. "This will allow you to stay in touch with your real parents," she said helpfully.

Dudley/Beat burst into tears again as the door slammed shut, separating him from his true family. He was starting to understand what Francine and Sue Ellen had endured at his hand, and wondered if this was an example of poetic justice.

"So," Mr. Green said to him, "do you like hamburgers?"

----

Visiting hours had commenced at the Elwood City Juvenile Detention Facility, and Alan had come with an urgent message for Binky and Molly. The two inmates faced him from the other side of the plexiglass wall, eager to hear his news.

"I have a plan for saving Fern and exposing Mansch," he revealed. "I can't tell you all the details now. Molly, you have to tell the truth about finding the diamonds right away."

"I can't do that," Molly protested. "Remember what the swan said?"

"I have reason to believe that Mansch will release Fern once you confess," said Alan. "Besides, if we expose him first, he'll kill her for sure."

"Okay," Molly agreed. "But your plan had better work, or else."

----

Confident of ultimate victory, Alan fell asleep quickly and slept soundly that night. He dreamed that Fern was embracing him, kissing him tenderly on the cheek, thanking him for rescuing her...

His calm was shattered by the shriek of a wailing siren.

His parents bolted upright. "Tegan!" they cried in unison.

When Alan emerged from his room, they were already racing down the stairway. The siren was the last sound they wanted to hear—it meant Tegan had violated the perimeter.

Over the clamor they could hear the not-so-distant sound of a car motor churning and rubber tires squealing against pavement. To their horror, the front door was hanging open.

"Alan, Joyce, you search the house," Mr. Powers ordered. "I'll look outside."

Alan and his mother pored over every inch of the house, including the guest bedroom, but Tegan could not be found. Alan's father walked back inside, shaking his head.

"Whoever was driving that car must have taken her," Alan suggested. He could think of only one suspect, but he dared not mention the name to his parents.

"I'll call the school," said Mr. Powers, picking up the phone. Outside, several police cars pulled alongside the curb, their flashing lights illuminating the dark street.

The Powers family didn't sleep another wink that night. Nor did they uncover the fate of Tegan, despite the assistance of the police officers and Ballford scientists.

"Either someone broke in and took her by force," said Dr. Minkowski, the eccentric aardvark man, "or she left willingly."

"There's no sign of forced entry," said a police officer.

"I didn't hear a struggle," said Mrs. Powers.

"Why would she leave willingly?" Mr. Powers wondered.

"It's possible that she merged with someone without your knowledge," Dr. Payne theorized. "As you know, she can read a lot from a person during a merge. Sometimes she becomes fascinated with the person, or even changes her personality to resemble the person. She may have left the house in hopes of merging with that person again."

Alan swallowed. It felt like he was swallowing a horse. It dawned on him that anything could have happened during the silent mental intercourse between Tegan and Mansch. Anything, up to and including Tegan switching to Mansch's side...

The day that followed was a happy day for everyone but him. Beat behaved in an unusually girlish manner, failed to answer the simplest science questions, and spoke in what sounded like a colonial accent. April Murphy returned to Elwood, and was picked up at the train station by Sue Ellen and Mrs. Krantz. Binky and Molly were released from juvenile detention, and were welcomed back as heroes by the other students.

Best of all, as the kids heard at the end of the day, a deer hunter had spotted Fern Walters stumbling through the forest on the borders of Elwood.

As Alan walked slowly toward the school exit, he was confronted by the only other people in the school who weren't overjoyed to the point of distraction at Fern's safe return—Binky and Molly.

"Hi, guys," he said sheepishly. "Nice to have you back."

"The police arrested my dad today," said Molly sourly. "What's the next step in your plan, genius?"

Alan could think of nothing to say. He didn't dare reveal that Tegan had disappeared, or that the plan was all her idea.

"Uh, everything's under control," was all he could choke out.

Molly waved a threatening fist. "Like I said, if your plan doesn't work, you'd better start buying up life insurance."

Alan groaned hopelessly as Binky and Molly strolled away, hand in hand. If Tegan didn't reappear soon, he was as good as dead.

----

To be continued in Arthur Goes Fifth III


	16. Life's a Switch

It was Wednesday afternoon in the fourth week of the school year, and an afternoon of celebration, for Fern Walters had returned unharmed from her ordeal as a kidnap victim. A multitude of her friends gathered at her house to welcome her and express gratitude that she had survived. All of her classmates were present, including Van, whose upper beak was in a cast. Although he couldn't speak intelligibly due to his injury, his emotions upon seeing his friend Fern again were clearly visible.

"After a week, they simply decided to release me," Fern related to Buster. "They never told me why they were holding me. They knew nothing about Mansch."

"Or pretended to know nothing," said Buster suspiciously.

"I'm sure you did your best to find me," said Fern, rubbing the rabbit boy's shoulder flirtatiously.

"I had Alan, Beat, and Odette to help me," Buster replied. "We called ourselves the BrainBusters. But there wasn't much we could do without your help."

"I'm positive Mansch is behind it all," said Fern. "The kidnappers let me go, Binky and Molly are released from juvie, and Molly's dad is arrested, all on the same day. Coincidence? I think not."

Also present at the joyful gathering were Sue Ellen and her good friend April Murphy, who looked like a twelve-year-old copy of Sue Ellen owing to the fact that she WAS a twelve-year-old copy of Sue Ellen. April had traveled from the future in hopes of preventing the murder of her parents, but had, unfortunately, only accelerated it.

"So you're back, April," said Fern, eyeing the girl warily. "I hope we don't have to save the world from you and Augusta again."

"Don't count on it," was April's friendly response. "One of the Augustas is imprisoned on another planet, and the other has lost her powers."

Only three of the guests had reason to be unhappy—Alan, Beat, and Dudley. Alan, because he had inadvertently lost his older sister Tegan as a result of the stratagem that had brought Fern back; Beat, because she was trapped in Dudley's body; Dudley, not because he was trapped in Beat's body (a fact which delighted him), but because he felt sorry for Beat.

"I understand you tried to help Buster find me," Fern said to Alan when she found the boy drowning his sorrows in a Sarah Soda.

"Yes," the glum boy replied, "but in the end, I had nothing to do with it."

It was a lie. He had become the catalyst for Fern's rescue by allowing Tegan to telepathically scan Mansch's mind, against the express orders of his parents. He had told no one. Now Tegan was gone, and with her all hope of exposing Mansch's crimes and clearing Molly's father.

In another corner of Fern's living room, Beat (or rather, Dudley in Beat's body) was trying to cheer up Dudley (or rather, Beat in Dudley's body), who seemed unwilling to talk to anyone. Beat was wearing a festive silk dress, while Dudley was clad in the nicest shirt and pants he could find in the wardrobe that now belonged to him.

"Why the long face, Dudley?" Fern asked the rat boy. "You should be happy."

"Yes, I know I should," said Dudley in a miserable British accent. "But a terrible thing has happened."

"You're not speaking in your usual accent," Fern observed. "You sound like Beat now."

"I was Beat," the boy mourned. "But not anymore, unfortunately."

"We exchanged bodies," explained Beat in a colonial accent. "It wasn't a very equitable trade."

Fern stared at the two in amazement. "Then you're really Dudley...and you're really Beat..."

The mixed-up kids nodded.

"So now it's your turn to be stuck as a boy," she remarked to Dudley. "If this keeps going around, I'll get a turn sooner or later."

"We're looking for a way to change back," said Beat. "But in the meantime, I'm enjoying myself immensely."

"Don't enjoy yourself too much," Dudley cautioned her. "Remember, you're a ten-year-old girl with..."

"Hey, Fern," said Prunella, who had suddenly appeared with a hand full of jelly beans. "I'm glad you're all right."

"So am I," said Fern glibly.

"Pardon me, Prunella," Dudley interjected, "but I wonder if I could ask a favor of you."

"Why are you speaking with a British accent?" Prunella asked the boy.

"I'll explain later."

----

Later came, while Dudley and Beat were following Prunella to her house.

"But when the transfer was complete, I found I no longer had Putnam's memories," Dudley recounted. "Without them, I can't operate the device to switch us back. But it occurred to me earlier today that his memories might have been accidentally copied to some other part of my brain, like the subconscious."

"I see what you're getting at," said Prunella as she led the two kids through her front door. "You want to be hypnotized."

"That's right," said Dudley. "If Putnam and Mavis are wandering around somewhere in the dark regions of my mind, hypnotism should bring them out."

Once inside, Prunella called to her sister Rubella, who was watching the video release of 'Mateless in Manhattan' for the fourteenth time. "Hey, Rubella. Can you do a hypnotism?"

"Sure, Prunie," replied her teenage sister, hitting the pause button on the remote.

"How are things going with you, Rubella?" Dudley asked the girl as the foursome ascended the wooden stairway to the attic.

Rubella shrugged. "Okay, I guess. I'm practicing my cooking so I can open a restaurant after I graduate from high school."

"You're not going to become a professional psychic like your mother?"

"I was never one to follow traditions," the curly-haired rat girl remarked.

When they were all seated around the crystal ball table, Beat spoke up. "I think you should hypnotize both of us. It's possible this Putnam fellow never left Beat's brain to begin with."

"Good idea," said Rubella. "Prunie, you hypnotize her, and I'll do Dudley."

"I'm Beat," Dudley reminded her.

"I don't want to," Prunella groused. "I can never get the mystical stuff right. Remember when I almost destroyed the world?"

"Please, Prunie," Rubella pleaded.

After some initial hesitation, Prunella agreed to perform the task. Shortly Rubella was seated across from Dudley, and Prunella from Beat, as the sisters dangled crystal pendants before the faces of their subjects.

"Look into the pendant," they intoned. "You see nothing but the pendant. You hear nothing but my voice." The reflected light from the candles danced about the pendants, dazzling Beat and Dudley into subconsciousness. "You are now in a state of deep hypnosis. Tell me your name."

"I'm Dudley Green," droned the rabbit-aardvark girl.

"I'm Beat Simon," mumbled the rat boy.

"Do you have any other names?"

"No," said Beat.

"I...I..." Dudley stammered. He began to glance around the dimly lit attic, confused. "Where am I?"

"You're in my house," Rubella told him. "You're safe. Now tell me your name."

"Uh, I'm not sure," said the dazed rat boy. "I want to say Andrew Putnam, but I also want to say Mavis Cutler. But I'm a boy, so I can't be Mavis. How did my nose get broken?"

"Prunie, you take it from here," said Rubella, rising from her chair. Prunella quickly snapped Beat out of her trance and took her sister's place.

"Let me talk to Mr. Putnam," she said to Dudley.

"I'm right here," said Dudley with sudden calmness.

"It's working," Beat marveled. "Now Beat will have her own body again."

"How old are you, Mr. Putnam?" Prunella inquired.

"I'm eighty-six," was Dudley's response. "Or I was, before I copied myself into this body. I must be nine or ten now. Is my old body dead?"

Beat nodded in Prunella's direction.

"Listen carefully," Prunella continued. "You were in Beat Simon's body, but you used your device to switch yourself into Dudley Green's body. Do you remember?"

"Yes," Dudley answered.

"But something went wrong, and you can't remember how to reverse it."

Dudley thought for a moment. "Interesting," he said analytically. "I seem to have become a subconscious presence in the boy's brain. I think I can fix that."

"Rubella, get a pen and paper," Prunella ordered her sister. Then she asked Dudley, "How do you fix it? How do you switch Beat and Dudley into their regular bodies?"

Beat hastily pulled the Opticron device from her knapsack as Dudley began to speak. "Before I tell you," he said in a mildly sinister tone of voice, "I have something to ask of you."

"What's that?"

"Alan's sister," said Dudley with a smirk. "What are her powers?"

----

Only a few minutes after he returned home from the party at Fern's, Alan was summoned to the phone by his mother. "Hello?"

"Alan, this is Dudley," came a girl's voice.

"Hi, Dudley," said the slightly befuddled Alan. "Why do you sound like a girl?"

"Never mind that," said the voice on the line. "I have an important question for you. Someone here is asking about your sister Tegan. He wants to know...what kind of powers she has. I don't know what that means."

As Alan pondered the request, he recalled the cryptic words that Beat herself had spoken to him—"Keep her secret. Keep her safe. Don't let anyone near her...especially me."

"Goodbye, Beat," he said accusingly, and hung up....

...only to be called again a few seconds later.

"Alan, this is Prunella. Don't hang up on me, okay? I need to know about Tegan's powers."

Without a word, Alan hung up the phone again...

...and it rang again.

"Alan, my name is Andrew Putnam."

It was obviously some kind of joke—the voice was that of Dudley Green. Yet the accent was one hundred percent modern-day American.

"What do you want?" Alan demanded. "Where are you?"

----

He found out soon enough, as he stood in Prunella's attic in front of the still-mesmerized rat boy.

"Your sister Tegan and your friend C.V. are Brainchildren," Dudley explained. "There are about two thousand Brainchildren in the world, each with a unique mental gift. C.V., for example, has the unenviable talent of triggering the fears of others."

"I haven't a clue what you're talking about," said Alan firmly. "Tegan doesn't have mental powers. She's just a girl."

"You take me for a fool," Dudley snapped. "She wears a neuroblocker—a device that inhibits the exercise of her powers. I know it because I invented it."

"That's ridiculous."

"I think you should listen to him," Beat urged.

"Okay," said Alan skeptically, "let's suppose you're telling the truth. What do you want with Tegan and her so-called powers?"

"They call you The Brain," Dudley replied. "You figure it out."

The mystified Alan pondered the things Dudley had told him...

"Wait," he suddenly spoke. "You said you started out as an old man, then you copied your mind into Beat, then you switched from Beat to Dudley."

The entranced rat boy nodded.

"I get it," said Alan with satisfaction. "You want to copy yourself into Tegan, so you can take advantage of her powers."

"With her consent, of course," said Dudley. "But that depends on the nature of her powers, and whether they would be useful to me."

"I'll tell you the nature of her powers," said Alan sharply. "She doesn't have any. End of discussion."

"Very well." The rat boy spoke in a menacing tone. "If you refuse to tell me what I want to know, then I will reciprocate in kind."

As Alan sighed incredulously, Beat jumped to her feet and stared at him with pleading eyes. "Please, Alan. You must tell him, or Beat will remain a boy forever."

"What are you complaining about?" was Alan's facetious reply. "You get to be a girl again."

As he trudged out of Prunella's house, he wondered if his life could become any worse. "I can only think of one way," he said silently. "The body-switching stories are true, and I'm next in line. I'll end up as Muffy...or even worse, Sue Ellen." He chuckled grimly at the thought.

"Hi, Mom," he greeted his mother upon entering. "Any news about Tegan?"

"No," Mrs. Powers answered from the kitchen. "But Molly called again. I think it's important."

With an exasperated sigh, Alan dropped himself in front of his desk and tried vainly to concentrate on his homework.

Before he knew it, another unwelcome distraction appeared on the scene—Dudley Green, de-hypnotized and almost on the verge of tears. "I'm begging you, Alan," said the rat boy earnestly as he stepped into the room. "Unless you tell Putnam what he wants to know, I'll be trapped as a boy for the rest of my life."

"I'm trapped as a boy for the rest of my life," was Alan's callous response. "You don't see me whining about it."

"Look at me!" Dudley gestured frantically with his hands. "Look at this ugly, broken-nosed, flat-chested male body! Is this how you want Beat Simon to spend the rest of her days?"

As much as he feared that the boy might be telling the truth, Alan dared not add to the damage he had already done. "I'm sorry," he said sympathetically. "Tegan has no special powers. If Putnam won't accept that answer, then you'll have to get your body back some other way."

After a long, painful "how could you do this to your friend" gaze, Dudley turned and walked out of Alan's room. The sound of the front door slamming followed sooner after.

His mind clogged with worries, Alan found his homework impossible to accomplish. He wandered about the house for a few minutes, looking for something to distract him from thoughts of Tegan, and finally settled upon watching TV. It was a Dark Bunny repeat, in which the evil Webmaster created a website which would switch the bodies of any two people who logged in at the same time. His first victims—Dark Bunny and the recently reformed Rat Woman.

"She's even better looking from this side," remarked Dark Bunny in Rat Woman's body.

Alan sighed impatiently. "These body-switching plots are getting stale," he commented.

As he stared idly at the screen, his mother entered the room and surveyed him with satisfaction. "I'd ask if you finished your homework," she said to him, "but I know I don't need to."

Alan only grunted.

"I know you're really worried about Tegan," Mrs. Powers continued. "Now that Fern's back, maybe you can get together with her, and your other friends, and do your 'pint-sized sleuth' thing again."

"I haven't told Fern," Alan replied. "I haven't told anyone."

"Why not?"

It was as good a time as any to come forward, Alan decided.

He picked up the remote and switched off the television.

"Mom," he said solemnly, "I have something to tell you, and you're not gonna like it."

----

To be continued in Arthur Goes Fifth III


End file.
